Congestive heart failure (CHF) affects about five million people, or two per cent of the population, in the US alone. There are 550,000 new cases diagnosed each year, and 45,000 deaths from CHF. As many as 20 million people may have unsuspected heart failure and are likely to develop symptoms within five years.

Typically, CHF occurs when an injured heart muscle is unable to pump strongly enough to meet the need for blood of the body's other organs. Patients with CHF are constantly tired, short of breath and in and out of hospital. One-third of them require repeat hospitalization within three months of discharge. Accounting for 3.5 million hospital stays per year, heart failure is the leading cause of hospitalization in the US .

Patients usually take combination drug therapy including diuretics and angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE) inhibitors to reduce the amount of fluid in the body, glycosides to increase the force of the heart's contractions and beta blockers to reduce activity of the heart and enhance survival. These drug therapies do not regenerate heart muscle or rebuild heart tissue. Instead, they alleviate the symptoms of heart failure such as shortness of breath and fatigue, but not without significant side effects.

Angioblast is developing MPC products capable of rebuilding damaged heart tissue by a two-pronged attack. They will induce the formation of new small arteries to supply more blood to damaged heart muscle and will also directly form new heart muscle cells. It is anticipated that MPCs will be delivered to the heart either by direct injection or surgical placement of a biocompatible patch, and will be used with existing drug therapies.