Strategies for myocardial repair.

The therapeutic recourse for end-stage heart disease is currently limited to cardiac transplantation. The ability to augment cardiomyocyte number in an end-stage heart might facilitate myocardial function. Augmentation of cardiomyocyte number may be achievable by the targeted expression of cell cycle regulatory genes to the myocardium. Alternatively, intracardiac grafting of exogenous cardiomyocytes might also provide a viable approach to augment cardiomyocyte number. Potential strategies for heart muscle regeneration via gene therapy and cellular transplantation are discussed.