Abstract
Accurate quantitative measurement of left ventricular (LV) ejection fraction (EF)
by 2-dimensional echocardiography is limited by subjective visual endocardial border
detection. Both harmonic and precision contrast microbubbles provide better delineation
of endocardial borders than fundamental imaging. The aim of this study was to correlate
2-dimensional echocardiographic quantification of LVEF measured by 4 currently available
techniques with radionuclide angiography. A total of 50 patients who underwent radionuclide
(EF) measurement (47 of 50 had technically difficult echocardiograms by fundamental
imaging) underwent echocardiography by 4 methods: fundamental alone, fundamental with
contrast, harmonic alone, and harmonic with contrast. Three echocardiologists measured
the biplane 2-dimensional echocardiographic LVEF independently and were blinded to
radionuclide angiography. The correlation of echocardiographic EF with radionuclide
EF improved incrementally with each method. However, contrast with harmonic imaging
provided the closest correlation (r = 0.95, 0.96, and 0.95 as assessed by the 3 independent
analysts.
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Article info
Publication history
Accepted:
June 23,
2000
Received in revised form:
June 23,
2000
Received:
May 18,
2000
Identification
Copyright
© 2000 Excerpta Medica Inc. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
