Comparison between the accuracy of transmitral pulsed-Doppler echocardiography and two dimensional echocardiography using dobutamine in detection of coronary artery disease

Abstract

Diastolic dysfunction precedes systolic dysfunction during the development of myocardial ischemia. Therefore, detection of diastolic dysfunction during diagnostic stress tests could be useful in the identification of myocardial ischaemia (Hoffmann et al, 1999). Nevertheless, in clinical practice the diagnosis of ischaemia during imaging stress tests has primarily focused on the induction of systolic dysfunction (Zamorano et al., 1998). However limited information exists regarding the relationship of left ventricular diastolic filling parameters measured by Doppler echocardiography during dobutamine stress echocardiography (DSE) and stress-induced symptoms or myocardial ischemia (Nakajima et al., 2009). Therefore the present study was undertaken to evaluate the added value of transmitral Doppler flow indices during dobutamine stress echocardiography and to compare sensitivity, specificity and diagnostic accuracy of these indices with conventional 2D dobutamine stress echocardiography.