Background: Chronic heart failure is a crucial health threat that has a significant negative impact on sufferers’ quality of life. Transcutaneous electrical stimulation of cervical vagus nerve is a non-invasive approach, and it might be useful for a large population of HF patient.

Objective: To evaluate the efficacy and safety of non-invasive vagus nerve stimulation as an adjuvant treatment of chronic heart failure.

Methods: Forty patients with chronic heart failure (NYHA- functional class II-III) with ejection fraction ≤40% participated in this study. Subjects were divided into 2 groups: Group A received tVNS, and Group B received sham tVNS; their ages ranged from 50 to 65 years old. Functional capacity level using the six-minute walk test, health-related quality of life via Minnesota Living with Heart Failure Questionnaire (MLHFQ), and heart muscle function via non-invasive echocardiogram (echo) to assess ejection fraction (EF), end-systolic volume (ESV), and end-diastolic volume (EDV), were measured pretreatment, after one session and posttreatment.

Results: No significant difference between groups pre-treatment (p >0.05). There was significance increase in 6MWT, and obvious improvement in MLHFQ, plus remarkable increase in heart function ‘EF, and decrease in ESV and EDV’ of group A compared with that of group B post treatment (p <0.05).