Left Ventricular Function After Primary Percutaneous Coronary Intervention: Role of Speckle Echocardiography

Overview

Recovery of the left ventricular function is variable from one patient to another, thus assessment of cardiac function by measuring left ventricular ejection fraction using echocardiography is the most common in the daily clinical practice. However, this technique has limitation related with its intra- and interobserver variability. A recent technique, 2D speckle tracking for assessing global longitudinal strain, has been introduced to reduce the variability and potentially has a higher accuracy. Speckle tracking is a method which uses two dimensions recording for measuring quantity of movement of myocardium in several segments. Speckle-tracking echocardiography is a current noninvasive ultrasound imaging technique that allows for an objective and quantitative evaluation of global and regional myocardial function independently from the angle of insonation and from cardiac translational movements,

Authors using 2D speckle tracking found that subclinical LV systolic dysfunction is common in patients with isolated severe mitral stenosis (MS) and is determined primarily by the hemodynamic variables of MS severity and reduced LV filling. BMV results in rapid recovery of LV systolic function in these patients through improvement in LV diastolic loading. These findings suggest that LV contractile properties in MS are modulated predominantly by LV diastolic filling rather than myocardial structural abnormality.

Conditions