Defining Clinically Meaningful Within-Patient Changes in Heart Failure: JACC: Heart Failure Position Statement

Relative and absolute risk reductions should both inform interpretation of clinical events

Imaging, hemodynamic, biomarker and functional measures require changes exceeding measurement variability and consideration of physiological context

Patient-reported health status measures, particularly the Kansas City Cardiomyopathy Questionnaire, currently have the strongest evidence supporting clinically meaningful thresholds

Many proposed cutpoints remain provisional, reflecting limited validation linking physiological changes to patient-perceived benefit or hard outcomes