BACKGROUND Left atrial (LA) enlargement is a predictor of worse outcome after catheter ablation for atrial fibrillation (AF). Widely used two-dimensional (2D)-echocardiography is inaccurate and underestimates real LA volume (LAV). We hypothesized that baseline clinical characteristics of patients can be used to adjust 2D-ECHO indices of LAV in order to minimize this disagreement. METHODS The ...

The feasibility of determining left atrial volumes (LAV) from LA echo dimensions was assessed in 36 children (group I) with normal cineangiographically determined LAV and 16 children (group II) with LAV overload. Conventional LA echo dimensions, obtained within 24 hours of cardiac catheterization, were compared to the angiographic LA anterior-posterior minor axes (LAmA) and LAV. There was excel...

BACKGROUND Heart transplant (HT) recipients demonstrate limited exercise capacity compared to normal patients, very likely for multiple reasons. In this study we hypothesized that left atrial volume (LAV), which is known to predict exercise capacity in patients with various cardiac pathologies including heart failure and hypertrophic cardiomyopathy is associated with limited exercise capacity o...

BACKGROUND Left atrial volume (LAV) and exercise capacity are important prognostic determinants of cardiovascular risk. Exercise intolerance and increased LAV are expected in patients with diastolic dysfunction. While dyspnea is the symptom reported by the patient and considered subjective, exercise capacity obtained by exercise testing provides an objective measure of cardiovascular fitness. T...

BACKGROUND Left atrial volume (LAV) is an important marker of heart failure (HF) severity. We hypothesized that LAV independently correlates with clinical outcomes in patients who receive cardiac resynchronization therapy with a defibrillator (CRT-D) and can be used for improved risk assessment in this population. METHODS AND RESULTS The benefit of CRT-D versus defibrillator-only therapy in r...

BACKGROUND Left atrial volume (LAV) increase is an indicator of diastolic dysfunction and a surrogate marker of significant left to right shunts. Normalization of LAV is currently performed by indexing to body surface area(1) (BSA(1)). The indexed LAV thus derived does not account for the nonlinear relationship of physiologic variables to BSA and has not been tested for independence to body siz...

Background Left atrial (LA) size is a strong predictor of cardiovascular events in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF) and a variety of other cardiovascular diseases. Left atrial volume (LAV) measurement is the preferred method for assessment of LA size. The most widely used technique for LAV assessment is the area-length (AL) method using 2D echocardiography. Studies have shown that AL meth...

Introduction Left atrial volume (LaV) is an important predictor of outcome for many cardiovascular conditions. The most commonly used method to estimate LaV is the area-length (AL) biplane formula based upon LA measures from 2 and 4 chamber (CH) views. Given the asymetrical shape of the LA, we hypothesized that a formula incorporating measures from all 3 conventional long-axis views is a more a...

The Local-As-View (LAV) integration approach aims at querying heterogeneous data in dynamic environments. In LAV, data sources are described as views over a global schema which is used to pose queries. Query processing requires to generate and execute query rewritings, but for SPARQL queries, the LAV query rewritings may not be generated or executed in a reasonable time. In this paper, we prese...

OBJECTIVES This study sought to identify preoperative predictors of postoperative atrial fibrillation (POAF) among patients undergoing cardiac surgery. BACKGROUND Postoperative atrial fibrillation is frequent after cardiac surgery and is associated with increased morbidity, mortality, prolonged hospital stay, and increased costs. Left atrial volume (LAV), a marker of chronically elevated left...