Value and limitations of two dimensional echocardiography in assessment of cardiomyopathy

Abstract

Primary myocardial diseases have traditionally been classified into congestive, hypertrophic and restrictive varieties. M mode echocardiography has proved extremely valuable in distinguishing congestive cardiomyopathy with major ventricular dilation and poor contractile performance from hypertrophic cardiomyopathy with predominant left ventricular hypertrophy (septum greater than posterior wall) and normal pump performance, and restrictive disorders with symmetric ventricular wall thickening and normal or diminished contractile function. The contributions of two dimensional echocardiography to the evaluation of patients with congestive or restrictive cardiomyopathy have been limited to certain specific situations, such as the recognition of left ventricular mural thrombi. Twenty-five patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy were studied to assess two dimensional echocardiography in the evaluation of patients with this disorder. Two dimensional echocardiography indicated that hypertrophy of the interventricular septum is not uniform from apex to base in all patients but may be greatest in the apical, mid or basal third. In addition, the anterior free wall of the left ventricle was involved in the hypertrophic process in approximately 50 percent of patients. Two dimensional echocardiography documented that the location of systolic anterior motion of the mitral valve in patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy is most often at the junction of the mitral valve leaflets and chordae tendineae, although the chordae themselves and even th papillary muscles may be involved in this movement. The heterogeneity of these characteristics may enable patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy to be classified into subsets of patients in whom meaningful therapeutic and prognostic implications may be derived. Finally, data derived from two dimensional echocardiography have shown that, although the left ventricle in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy conforms in some degree to the configuration of a catenoid, this geometric conformation is unlikely to account for the genesis of this order.