Left ventricular mass in normal adult Indians & its correlation with anthropometric parameters

Important differences were found to exist between male and non-pregnant female Indian adults in the echocardiographically determined left ventricular mass (170.58 +/- 51.91 g vs 131.14 +/- 42.84 g, P less than 0.001) and relationship of left ventricular mass (LVM) to age, body weight, height, body surface area (BSA) and body mass index (BMI). In males, LVM has a fair to good correlation with age, body weight, height, BSA and BMI (P less than 0.001). However, in female subjects, LVM correlates modestly with age, weight, BSA, BMI (P less than 0.01) but not with height. LVM can be best expressed by indexing to body weight in both sexes, but differences persist when other anthropometric parameters are used as denominators.