Connection between right ventricular pressure and the ECG.

According to the literature, electrocardiographic signs of right ventricular hypertrophy have low sensitivity. The cause of this low sensitivity may be attributed to the original studies that were performed mostly in children with hypoplastic left ventricles or congenital heart abnormalities. In adulthood cases of normal or hypertrophic left ventricles, electrocardiographic right ventricular hypertrophy can only be detected during the late phase of ventricular depolarization.

[Clinical significance of incomplete right bundle branch block].

In authors' opinion the majority of the physicians speak about an incomplete right bundle branch block in cases of a terminal r'wave in lead V1 of the ECG, when the QRS complex is not wider than 0.12 sec. These ECG anomalies are not properly separated in the literature, either.

A new possibility in the study of heart activation: the nondipolar body surface map.

The main goal of the present paper is to study the temporal and spatial course of cardiac electrical activation noninvasively, and to acquire more information than can be obtained from conventional methods, such as electrocardiography or vectorcardiography. The single moving resultant heart dipole is determined from a set of measured body surface potential maps before dipolar and nondipolar theoretical body surface potential maps are calculated. These three kinds of maps are studied together in different electro-cardiological situations (normal, left and right bundle branch block, and necrosis) during the entire cardiac cycle.

Anti-anginal effect of Tenormin (atenolol).

The anti-anginal effect of Tenormin (atenolol) has been examined besides placebo control by single blind method in 20 patients with ischaemic heart disease, suffering from stable effort angina proved by coronarography. It has been observed that atenolol significantly decreases the weekly number of anginal attacks, and the amount of sublingual nitroglycerin consumption. It has been proved that atenolol successfully prevents the exercise-induced elevation of blood pressure and heart rate, increases exercise tolerance, decreases myocardial O2 consumption.

[Clinical value of body surface mapping in the diagnosis of ischemic heart disease].

A series of 137 patients suffered in clinically documented angina pectoris were analyzed by 12-lead exercise ECG, exercise body surface potential mapping and exercise thallium scintigraphic methods and the results were compared to that of selective coronary angiography and left ventriculography. If coronary artery stenosis were considered to be significant in the presence of more than 70% vessel narrowing, the sensitivity figures were 76, 93 and 88% for exercise 12-lead ECG, exercise body surface potential mapping and exercise thallium scintigraphy, respectively. In considering 50% coronary artery narrowing to be significant, the same figures were 78, 94 and 89%.

Comparative evaluation of the effect of balloon dilatation by exercise precordial mapping and exercise 201-thallium scintigraphy.

Precordial exercise electrocardiographic mapping and exercise 201-thallium scintigraphy were simultaneously used on sixteen patients before, shortly after and three months after percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA) to evaluate the immediate and late results of the intervention. In spite of the limited number of observations, positive exercise precordial mapping and or a reversible 201-thallium perfusion defect after PTCA seem to be indicative of failure of balloon dilatation or of development of restenosis in a given coronary artery. "Reverse minimum", that is the minimum in the resting precordial map which disappears on exercise, may be a sign of segmental coronary artery occlusion and well functioning collateral supply.

Antianginal effects of atenolol and pindolol in patients with stable effort angina pectoris.

A double blind, randomised crossover study with 20 patients was performed to compare the antianginal effects of atenolol 100 mg once daily and pindolol 5 mg thrice daily. After a placebo run-in period, 2 treatments were given for 2 wk each. The number of anginal attacks and the nitroglycerin (NTG) consumption were determined.

[Cardiac and cardiopulmonary changes in systemic lupus erythematosus].

(SLE) One hundred patients suffering from systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) were examined by clinical, non invasive cardiological, radiological and laboratory methods. Valve diseases were revealed by M-mode echocardiographic examination in 17 patients. 14 patients had various conduction disturbances.

Correlation of electrocardiologic and pathologic findings in 100 cases of Q wave and non-Q wave myocardial infarction.

Of 100 cases of acute myocardial infarction as shown on autopsy, 55 cases were transmural infarcts and 45 were subendocardial. Pathologic Q waves appeared in 67% of the cases of transmural infarct and in 30% of subendocardial infarct. In transmural infarcts, Q wave infarcts occurred twice as frequently as non-Q wave infarcts.

Cardiac and cardiopulmonary disorders in patients with ankylosing spondylitis and rheumatoid arthritis.

One hundred patients suffering from ankylosing spondylitis (AS) and one hundred patients suffering from rheumatoid arthritis (RA) were examined by clinical, non-invasive cardiological, radiological and laboratory methods to determine the prevalence of their cardiac and cardiopulmonary disorders. Fourteen patients with AS and 24 patients with RA had several valvular abnormalities. Among the patients not having any valvular abnormality, systolic dysfunction of the myocardium was detectable in 15 and 11 cases respectively, and cor pulmonale was diagnosed in 16 and 7 cases respectively.

Comparative study on the short-term effects of angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitors (Lopirin, SQUIBB and Tensiomin), and dihydralazine in chronic cardiac failure.

The authors have compared the short-term effect of two captopril (ACE inhibitor) preparations namely the Lopirin (SQUIBB) and Tensiomin (EGIS) and dihydralazine as well as placebo in 15 patients with severe heart failure (NYHA III-IV, class). In case of 8 patients with NYHA IV, functional class the short-term effect of the combined therapy of dihydralazine and Lopirin and dihydralazine and Tensiomin as well dihydralazine and placebo have been compared. The underlying disease was dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) and ischaemic heart disease (IHD).

Detection and localization of ventricular preexcitation in Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome (comparative study with body surface mapping).

21 patients with Wolff-Parkinson-White (WPW) syndrome were investigated through radionuclide imaging and body surface mapping. Ventricular preexcitation was localized by display of identical phase ventricular regions (phase display). In 79% of the cases radioisotope and body surface mapping methods have identical results for the site of preexcitation.

When does relaxation actually begin? The early phases of relaxation.

Exact timing of relaxation within the cardiac cycle was carried out by aid of polygrams consisting of epicardial segmental length curves, contractile force, left ventricular, left atrial and aortic pressures, indirect carotid curves, apex cardiogram, their derivatives and ECG reference tracings in the open-chest dog heart. The relaxation starts in late systole before aortic valve closure, at the nadir of the epicardial segmental length curve and at the climax of the contractile force curve. Onset of relaxation is indicated by the late systolic knee of the left ventricular pressure curve and, by the apex cardiogram as well as by the start of the downstroke of the negative phase on their first derivatives.

The effect of experimentally induced myocardial ischemia on the norepinephrine metabolism of the dog heart.

Myocardial ischemia is known to provoke an excess in circulating norepinephrine and thus be related to an increased irritability of the heart. In the present experiments, we studied the norepinephrine and potassium content, oxygen tension, and pH values of the effluent of coronary sinus after thoracotomy and catheter placement into the coronary sinus. Once a steady state was reached, the measurements were repeated in the fifth, tenth, 20th, and 60th minutes of experimental myocardial ischemia provoked by coronary ligation of the left anterior descending coronary artery.