The efficacy and safety of sildenafil in Chinese patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension.

Sildenafil has been suggested to be a cost-effective treatment for pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH). On account of the lack of data confirming its benefit in PAH patients, sildenafil has not been adopted in China for the treatment of PAH. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the efficacy, safety and 1-year survival of Chinese patients with PAH treated with sildenafil.

[Quantitative evaluation of ischemic myocardium by adenosine tissue Doppler stress echocardiography.].

Objective: To evaluate the value of adenosine tissue Doppler stress echocardiography on ischemic myocardium.

Methods: Routine dosage (140 microgxkg(-1)xmin(-1) IV for 6 min) adenosine stress echocardiography was performed on 40 patients with chest pain for diagnosis of coronary artery disease (CAD). The images of left ventricular myocardial motion were acquired by tissue Doppler imaging (TDI) based on traditional 2D stress echocardiography before and 3 min, 6 min after adenosine stress (GE Vivid 7, USA).

[Left ventricular dyssynchrony evaluated by echocardiography in chronic heart failure patients with normal and wide QRS duration].

Objective: The aim of the study is to evaluate the left ventricular (LV) dyssynchrony in chronic heart failure (HF) patients with normal and wide QRS duration.

Methods: Time to peak velocity at peak systolic and early diastolic phase (Ts and Te) were determined in 12 segments of LV by echocardiography (GE Vivid 7) in 54 HF patients (28 with wide and 26 with normal QRS duration) and 15 normal controls to evaluate LV systolic and diastolic dyssynchrony. The risk factors related to LV dyssynchrony were also evaluated.

Q fever endocarditis: the Mayo Clinic experience.

Objectives: To report the Mayo Clinic experience of Q fever endocarditis.

Background: Q fever endocarditis is rare in North America with few case reports in the literature. The Centers for Disease Control lists Q fever as a reportable illness but does not differentiate endocarditis as a syndrome in its database.