[Problems and Perspectives of Echocardiographic Evaluation of the Left Ventricular Diastolic Function]

This literature review is devoted to noninvasive evaluation of the left ventricular (LV) diastolic function by echocardiography with special stress on existing problems of detection of LV dysfunction by Doppler echocardiography of transmitral blood flow. Basing on existent algorithms one often cannot clearly judge whether LV dysfunction is present even when such methods are used as assessment of blood flow in pulmonary veins, transmitral blood flow during the Valsalva maneuver, etc. The review also contains discussion and analysis of newly suggested Doppler echocardiography based algorithms of detection of LV diastolic dysfunction and estimation of its severity (two-dimensional deformation of left atrial walls, three-dimensional echocardiography and three-dimensional deformation of the left ventricle).