Evaluation of the Tp-Te Interval, QTc and P-Wave Dispersion in Patients With Coronary Artery Ectasia

Evaluation of cardiac chamber functions by speckle-tracking echocardiography in the presence of coronary artery flow disturbances other than stenosis: A review

Conditions other than stenosis also disturb the coronary flow. Such conditions include the coronary slow flow phenomenon, coronary artery ectasia, and coronary artery tortuosity. Evidence exists regarding myocardial dysfunction in these conditions. In this review, we present studies that have used speckle-tracking echocardiography to determine whether coronary flow disturbances are accompanied by myocardial dysfunction. Additionally, we seek to show the gaps in knowledge concerning this issue and the dimensions that future studies should consider.

Coronary Artery Ectasia: Review of the Non-Atherosclerotic Molecular and Pathophysiologic Concepts

Coronary artery ectasia (CAE) is frequently encountered in clinical practice, conjointly with atherosclerotic CAD (CAD). Given the overlapping cardiovascular risk factors for patients with concomitant CAE and atherosclerotic CAD, a common underlying pathophysiology is often postulated. However, coronary artery ectasia may arise independently, as isolated (pure) CAE, thereby raising suspicions of an alternative mechanism. Herein, we review the existing evidence for the pathophysiology of CAE in order to help direct management strategies towards enhanced detection and treatment.

P wave dispersion in patients with erectile dysfunction

Background and aims

P wave dispersion (PWD) has been reported to be a non-invasive electrocardiographic predictor for atrial fibrillation. The aim of this study is to evaluate PWD between men with erectile dysfunction (ED) and healthy controls in order to investigate whether PWD was prolonged in patients with ED and related to severity of the disease.

Methods

This study included a total of 72 men (42 patients with ED and 30 healthy controls). Demographic data and clinical features were recorded on admission. An electrocardiographic evaluation was obtained to measure PWD values for both patients and controls.

Results

Maximum P wave duration was 108.5 ± 4.7 and 108.3 ± 4.3 in ED group and control group, respectively (p = 0.748). Minumum P wave duration was significantly higher in the control group than in the ED group. PWD was 48.1 ± 5.9 in the ED group. As a result, PWD was prolonged in patients with ED (48.1 ± 5.9 vs. 38.0 ± 3.9, p < 0.05). A significant negative correlation was observed between IIEF score and PWD values (p < 0.05, r = −0.662).

Conclusions

Patients with ED exhibited prolonged PWD values compared with normal controls. In addition, PWD was found to be associated with severity of the disease.

Conventional and new electrocardiographic criteria for hypertension-mediated cardiac organ damage: A narrative review

Hypertension-mediated organ damage (HMOD) is frequently observed in hypertensive patients at different cardiovascular (CV) risk profile. This may have both diagnostic and therapeutic implications for the choice of the most appropriate therapies. Among different markers of HMOD, the most frequent functional and structural adaptations can be observed at cardiac level, including left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH), diastolic dysfunction, aortic root dilatation, and left atrial enlargement. In particular, LVH was shown to be a strong and independent risk factor for major CV events, namely myocardial infarction, stroke, congestive heart failure, CV death. Thus, early identification of LVH is a key element for preventing CV events in hypertension. Although echocardiographic assessment of LVH represents the gold standard technique, this is not cost-effective and cannot be adopted in routine clinical practice of hypertension. On the other hand, electrocardiographic (ECG) assessment of HMOD relative to the heart is a simple, reproducible, widely available and cost-effective method to assess the presence of LVH, and could be preferred in large scale screening tests. Several new indicators have been proposed and tested in observational studies and clinical trials of hypertension, in order to improve the relatively low sensitivity of the conventional ECG criteria for LVH, despite high specificity. This article reviews the differences in the use of the main conventional and the new 12 lead ECG criteria of LVH for early assessment of asymptomatic, subclinical cardiac HMOD in a setting of clinical practice of hypertension.

Comparing of Tp-Te Interval and Tp-Te/Qt Ratio in Patients with Preserved, Mid-Range and Reduced Ejection Fraction Heart Failure

BACKGROUND

Heart failure (HF) is classified in three class: HF with preserved EF (HFpEF); normal or LVEF ≥ 50%, HF with reduced EF (HFrEF); LEVF < 40% and newly HF mid-range EF (HFmrEF); LVEF 40-49%. On Electrocardiography (ECG) T wave, Tpeak-Tend (Tp-Te) interval reflects transmural dispersion of repolarisation (TDR) which of these indexes have been proposed as predictors of risk for ventricular arrhythmia (VA) in many cardiac diseases.

AIM

Aim of this study to asses these indices of TDR among three HF class.

METHODS

Total of 192 patients were included in this study.

RESULTS

Many of indices like Tp-Te, Tp-Te/QT wasn't different between groups (P > 0.05). But mean Q-Tpeak (QTp), S-Tend (S-Te) and S-Tpeak (S-Tp) were found significantly different between groups (P < 0.05). Again S-Te was found different according to having fragmented QRS (fQRS) on ECG (P = 0.031). Comparing to mitral inflow E/A parameters showed significant differences for Tp-Te, Tp-Tec, Tp-Te/QT, Tp-Te/QTc and Tp-Tec/QTc parameters. Finally, we found correlations between S-Te and white blood cell (WBC) (r = - 0.171; P = 0.037) and S-Tp and WBC (r = - 0.170; P = 0.038) and between S-Te and fQRS (r = 0.158; P = 0.031).

CONCLUSIONS

We didn't find differences for many of indices of TDR like Tp-Te interval between groups except QTp, S-Te, S-Tp intervals. Also, S-Te and fQRS showed significant correlation. For prediction of ventricular arrhythmia and cardiovascular death newer indexes on ECG are needed to be established in the future which will make us facilitate to distinguish high risk patients.