Nine patients with anatomically documented vegetations on one or more cusps of the aortic valve had echocardiograms in which abnormal echoes were associated with the aortic leaflet echoes. The motion of the abnormal echoes during systole correlated well with the anatomic location of vegetations: a vegetation on the right coronary cusp moved anteriorly with systole while a vegetation on the nonc...

The most common mechanical measure of the heart integrates ventricular strain between end-diastole and end-systole in order to provide a measure of contraction. Here an approach is described for estimating a correlate to local passive mechanical properties. Passive strain is measured by estimating ventricular strain during atrial systole. During atrial systole the atria contract causing passive...

The transmural distribution of left coronary blood flow during systole was studied by measuring the myocardial uptake of a bolus of Rb introduced into the coronary circulation when the perfusion was limited to the periods of systole. The measurement revealed a transmural gradient of systolic blood flow with a flow rate in the outer fourth of the left ventricle about twice that in the inner four...

• In the analysis of left ventricular dynamics, geometric measurements provide one important index of cardiac performance. Although previous studies ' suggest that the major change during the ejection phase of systole is a decrease of transverse dimension, the details of this change at rest and during exercise remain to be established. Moreover, these dimensional changes, coincident with the de...

BACKGROUND Cardiac diffusion tensor imaging (cDTI) measures the magnitudes and directions of intramyocardial water diffusion. Assuming the cross-myocyte components to be constrained by the laminar microstructures of myocardium, we hypothesized that cDTI at two cardiac phases might identify any abnormalities of laminar orientation and mobility in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM). METHODS We p...

The mechanism of forward flow produced by precordial compression during CPR was investigated with the aid of echocardiographic and hemodynamic measurements in anesthetized, mechanically ventilated domestic pigs. Both mitral and tricuspid valves opened during compression diastole and closed during compression systole. Valve motion persisted throughout resuscitation in 17 of 22 animals which were...

• The influence of heniodynamic variables on the duration of certain phases of ventricular systole has been studied by several investigators in intact animals and in isolated heart preparations.' Even in isolated hearts, it is not possible to change one heniodynainic variable without inducing changes in one or more intrinsic determinants of the heart's performance. For example, augmenting strok...

BACKGROUND Prediction of End-Systole time is of utmost importance for cardiac MRI to correctly associate acquired k-space lines during reconstruction of cine acquisitions. This prediction is usually based on the patient's heart rate using Weissler's formula, which was calibrated by linear regression within a population and cannot account for individual variability. OBJECTIVE We propose an aut...

Simultaneous electrocardiograms, phonocardiograms, and echocardiograms were recorded in 21 patients with mitral valve prolapse. Four patients with holosystolic mitral valve prolapse on echocardiogram had smaller resting end-diastolic volumes than the remaining 17 patients with late systolic echocardiopraphy prolapse (p greater than 0.01). Thirteen of the 17 patients with late systolic prolapse ...