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Updated: Jun 23, 2026

Echocardiographic Approaches and Protocols for Comprehensive Phenotypic Characterization of Valvular Heart Disease in Mice
Published on: February 14, 2017
A-dip of the aortic valve by M-mode echocardiography
Ioannis Stathopoulos1, Themistoklis Nissirios, Robert Ostfeld
1Montefiore Medical Center, Albert Einstein School of Medicine Cardiology Bronx, NY, USA. jstathopoulos@nyp.org
Abstract:
We present a case with the previously unreported finding of an a-dip in the M-mode tracing of the aortic valve. An a-dip is commonly seen in the M-mode tracing of the pulmonic valve motion, and represents near equalization of pulmonary artery and right ventricular end- -diastolic pressures during atrial contraction. M-mode echocardiography has become an ancillary study to the basic two-dimensional examination, but can often convey important features of cardiac hemodynamics quite elegantly, as the present case demonstrates.
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