Importance of heart weight, weights of cardiac ventricles and left ventricle plus septum/right ventricle ratio in assessing cardiac hypertrophy

Abstract

The present communication deals with the observations made during the study of 140 hearts (138 from medico-legal postmortems and 2 from post-natal deaths). The formalin fixed heart was dissected to separate non-muscular portion (NMP), right ventricle (RV), and left ventricle with septum (LV + S). The weights of the different components of the adult heart were affected by sex and body built not by age or body length. In most of the hearts the total weight varied from 180 to 320 Gm, the weight of RV, from 40 to 80 Gm, and LV + S, from 100 to 180 Gm. NMP was neither affected by age nor by ventricular weight. The coefficient of correlation between the heart weight and NMP was 0.93. Heart weight in Gm could be represented as equaled to 38.89 + 4.09 NMP. LV + S/RV ratio ranged from 1.64-3.84 : 1 in males and 1.73--3.1 : 1 in females, averaged being 2.52 : 1 and 2.44 : 1 respectively. No correlation between the weights of RV and LV + S was found. An attempt has been made to lay down the criterion for normal heart and for ventricular hypertrophy. The importance of total heart weight, weights of ventricles and the ratio is assessment of cardiac hypertrophy is discussed.