[Doppler echocardiography in chronic right ventricular pressure load]

Doppler-echocardiography (DEC) was performed before cardiac catheterization in 61 consecutive patients (25 women, 36 men; aged 59 +/- 10.6 years) with pulmonary hypertension. Chronic obstructive lung disease was its cause in 32, mitral valve disease in 16 and dilated cardiomyopathy in 13 patients. The subcostal approach was possible in all patients and a semiquantitative assessment into three degrees of severity determined from right ventricular wall thickness and size, as well as the diameter of the inferior vena cava. The severity grade was closely correlated with the level of pulmonary hypertension. In the absence of all signs of increased right ventricular load (grade 0) the mean pulmonary arterial pressure was 18.7 +/- 6.2 mm Hg, in grade I it was 15 and 22 mm Hg (only two patients), in grade II 29.9 +/- 11.9 and in grade III 41.1 +/- 8.6 mm Hg. 13 of the 21 patients in grade 0 or I had no manifest signs of pulmonary hypertension, but this was the case in only 6 of 22 in grade II and none in grade III. In 42 patients (69%) the systolic pulmonary artery pressure could be measured by DEC and it correlated well with the values obtained by cardiac catheterization (P < 0.001, r = 0.92). These findings show that DEC can provide semiquantitative and, in most cases, even exact evidence of chronic right ventricular overload.