BACKGROUND Sepsis can be complicated by severe myocardial dysfunction and is associated with increased nitric oxide (NO) production by inducible NO synthase (NOS2). To investigate the role of NOS2 in endotoxin-induced myocardial dysfunction in vivo, we studied wild-type and NOS2-deficient mice. METHODS AND RESULTS Serial echocardiographic parameters of myocardial function were measured before...

Postextrasystolic potentiation was studied during control and 5 minutes after coronary occlusion in epicardial and endocardial regions of 12.open-chest dogs. Segmental behavior evaluated with ultrasonic crystals. was correlated with regional myocardial blood flow (MBF) measured with radioactive inicrospheres. A similar correlation was found between the percentage of systolic shortening in poste...

BACKGROUND Whether diabetes mellitus (DM) adversely affects left ventricular (LV) structure and function independently of increases in body mass index (BMI) and blood pressure is controversial. METHODS AND RESULTS Echocardiography was used in the Strong Heart Study, a study of cardiovascular disease in American Indians, to compare LV measurements between 1810 participants with DM and 944 with...

BACKGROUND Although oxygen inhalation therapy has long been used in the treatment of acute myocardial ischemia, experimental evidence that increased arterial PO2 has any beneficial effect in the absence of hypoxemia is equivocal. In this study, we used a swine model of subendocardial myocardial ischemia to determine the effects of arterial hyperoxia on regional myocardial contractile function (...

BACKGROUND Measurement of regional left ventricular (LV) function is predicted on the ability to compare equivalent LV segments at different time points during the cardiac cycle. Standard techniques of short-axis acquisition in two-dimensional echocardiography, cine computed tomography, and standard magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) acquire images from a fixed plane and fail to compensate for th...

In diastolic heart failure, the left ventricular (LV) ejection fraction (EF) is normal and there is increased passive stiffness with impaired relaxation of the ventricle, resulting in disturbances in the pattern of filling and elevated diastolic pressure.1–3 The mechanism underlying such failure has been thought to be principally diastolic because LV diastolic function is universally abnormal a...

The effects of graded increments of passive head-up tilt on the duration of the systolic time intervals corrected for heart rate were investigated in 15 normal subjects. Head-up tilt caused a prolongation of the pre-ejection period and a shortening of the left ventricular ejection time, while total electromechanical systole diminished minimally. The lengthening of the pre-ejection period and ab...

To investigate the effect of Kawasaki syndrome on myocardial function, as well as the influence of high-dose intravenous gamma-globulin therapy on resolution of functional abnormalities, we studied 98 patients with Kawasaki syndrome during five time intervals from onset of illness: 1) 10 days or less, 2) 11-31 days, 3) 1-3 months, 4) 3-12 months, and 5) 1-3 years. Normal controls included 48 ch...

he physical forces that impede myocardial shortening afterload) are highly relevant to pharmacologic, mechanial, and surgical treatments for left ventricular systolic ysfunction. The maintenance of a normal or near-normal fterload, matched appropriately to robust myocardial conractility and accompanied by adequate venous return and eart rate, together ensure the teleologic cardiac function of e...

BACKGROUND Cardiac complications contribute significantly to morbidity and mortality in children with HIV/AIDS. These rates have been under-reported in sub-Saharan African children. METHODS This was an observational, cross-sectional Doppler echocardiographic study of ventricular systolic function, performed at a tertiary clinic on children with HIV/AIDS. RESULTS Left ventricular systolic dy...