Regional wall motion analysis in patients with idiopathic dilatedcardiomyopathy

摘要

The indices of the global and regional left ventricular functionwere compared in 16 patients with dilated cardiomyopathy and in 16patients with ischemic heart disease, matched for ejection fraction andseverity of heart failure. The end-diastolic and end-systolic volumestended to be larger in dilated than in ischemic patients. However,regional systolic shortenings in anterior, inferior and apical areaswere identical in both groups. The regional peak filling rates weresimilar in both groups and the indices of sphericity were identical.Thus, at a late stage, regional function becomes indistinguishablebetween dilated and ischemic patients. This suggests that, independentlyof the etiology, there is a common remodeling process responsible forleft ventricular dilatation and regional dysfunction