Left atrial remodeling and response to valsartan in the prevention of recurrent atrial fibrillation: the GISSI-AF echocardiographic substudy.

Background: Left atrial (LA) dilation precedes or appears early after the onset of atrial fibrillation (AF) and factors in perpetuating the arrhythmia. Angiotensin receptor blockers were proposed for reversing LA remodeling. We evaluated the effect of valsartan on LA remodeling in patients with a recent episode of AF and the effect of LA size on AF recurrence (AFr).

Noninvasive pacemaker stress echocardiography for diagnosis of coronary artery disease: a multicenter study.

Objective: We evaluated the feasibility, safety, and diagnostic accuracy of noninvasive pacemaker stress echocardiography (PASE) test as a potential alternative to exercise or pharmacologic stress in patients with suspected or known coronary artery disease (CAD).

Background: Transesophageal atrial pacing echocardiography is an accurate test for detection of CAD, but its practical impact has been blunted by semi-invasiveness. In the expanding population of patients with permanent pacemakers (PMs), a pacing stress test can be administered noninvasively by external programming of the PM.

[Myocarditis in legionellosis. A case report].

Cardiac involvement during Legionnaires' disease has been rarely described; few cases of myocarditis, pericarditis and endocarditis were reported. We describe a case of myocarditis associated to pneumonia, with high antibody title suggesting a disease due to Legionella pneumophila. The patient had severe myocardial damage, with overt heart failure and important ECG and Doppler-echocardiographic abnormalities, without associated multiorgan involvement.

[Diagnosis of pulmonary thromboembolism by transesophageal echocardiography. Report of a case].

We describe the case of a 73-year-old man, admitted after several days of moderate dyspnea, followed by sincopal episode. Transesophageal echocardiography clearly demonstrated a high resolution image indicating thromboembolus of the proximal right main pulmonary artery. The patient's clinical conditions were moderately impaired; a treatment with heparin followed by warfarin was started.

[Female gender and acute myocardial infarction: what role does it play in the early and late prognosis].

The primary purpose of this study is to examine the influence of the female gender on the early and 1-year post-discharge prognosis after acute myocardial infarction (AMI). Moreover, the therapeutic approaches are compared between the two sexes during the early phase of AMI. We performed a retrospective cohort study of 341 patients, 219 men and 122 women, consecutively admitted to the coronary care unit with AMI.