Implanted in the pulmonary artery, this wireless sensor allows doctors to detect fluid buildup weeks before symptoms appear. When the heart is unable to pump enough blood to meet the body's needs, fluid builds up in the surrounding tissue. For millions suffering from congestive heart failure, this early warning system may mean fewer emergency room visits, reduced hospitalizations, and improved quality of life.

"I think it's huge," Dr. Liviu Klein, a cardiologist at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) Medical Center, told The Epoch Times. "We have something now to avoid hospitalizations. If people are healthier at home, they live longer."

Though the term "heart failure" sounds like the heart has stopped working, the condition is chronic and can drag on for years, draining patients physically, emotionally, and financially. But the constant fear of the next crisis can overshadow everything else, Klein said.

While CHF can not be cured, it can be managed with multiple medications, diet restrictions, and daily weight checks. Still, sometimes the patient struggles to breathe.

"By the time they realize what's happening, it's already too late to take a pill," Klein said. "They need an IV."

Small Sensor, Big Impact

The CHAMPION trial, a clinical study, beginning in 2007, marked a significant milestone in heart failure treatment, Klein said, because before this trial, the remote hemodynamic management of heart failure did not exist. This trial showed that the device reduced repeat hospitalizations in heart failure patients by nearly 40 percent. Klein participated in the multi-center trial, involving 550 subjects across 64 U.S. sites, as a site co-investigator at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago and as the principal investigator at the University of California at San Fransisco in the post-approval study.

The study's results, published in 2010 in the Journal of Cardiac Failure, led to the development of a microelectromechanical system, called CardioMEMS. Interventional cardiologist, Dr. Jay S Yadav, founded the CardioMEMS company in 2001 to develop new devices for treating chronic cardiovascular diseases such as heart failure.