[Quantitative left ventriculography: comparative investigations in normal patients (author's transl)]

In 17 patients with no demonstrable cardiac disease, analysis of the ventriculogram with respect to regional wall motion was performed. These normal patients formed the basis for establishing the normal ranges for 6 different methods of regional wall motion analysis (3 chord, 2 radial, 1 area). In each method, analysis of regional shortening showed a Gaussian distribution. The normal range of a segment was defined as the mean +/- 2 standard deviations, hence comprising 95% of normals. Comparing our 6 normal ranges with the ranges as initially described by their respective authors, the general shape of our curves was largely in agreement with the original curves. In detail, the amount of regional shortening showed some discrepancies, and only our normal range curve, calculated according to the method of Leighton, was highly comparable to the original range of the author, as well as to the one of Brower. Reasons for the discrepancies using other methods may be accounted for by different catheter conditions, different patient material and a subjective variation in delineating the contours of diastole and particularly of systole. It is concluded that normal ranges of a method for wall motion analysis cannot be applied directly from the literature without their prior verification under the special conditions of the angiographic technique and evaluation used.