Technology and techniques of cardiac catheterization to assess the ventricular function have been developed in the recent decades. The approach for assessing function is based on the measurement of cardiac output which depends on preload, afterload and ventricular contractility. Clinical application of Frank-Starling principle is useful for characterizing human heart failure. Conventionally, the isovolumic phase index(peak positive dP/dt) and ejection phase index (ejection fraction) have been applied to evaluate ventricular systolic function. Recently, ventricular diastolic function as well as systolic function can be estimated using ventricular pressure-volume loops obtained by simultaneous measurement of pressure and volume. The slope of end-systolic pressure-volume relation represents a load-independent index of ventricular contractility and assessing ventricular end-diastolic pressure-volume relation can express ventricular passive diastolic compliance for the evaluation of human heart failure.