Predictive factors of left atrial spontaneous echo contrast in patients with rheumatic mitral valve stenosis: a retrospective study of 159 patients.

Background: Mitral valve stenosis is a common manifestation of chronic rheumatic heart disease. The presence of spontaneous echo contrast in the left atrium and left atrial appendage has been reported to be an independent predictor of thrombo-embolic risk in patients with mitral stenosis. The objective of this study was to retrospectively investigate various clinical and echocardiographic variables to predict the spontaneous echo contrast in these patients.