Chest
Echocardiographic Observations Regarding Pericardial Effusions Associated with Cardiac Disease
Section snippets
METHODS
Seventy-six consecutive echocardiographic studies showing definite pericardial effusions were examined. Detailed chart review was performed to assess the most likely cause for effusion in each patient. The most likely etiology for effusion, size of effusion, right ventricular internal dimension in diastole, left ventricular internal dimension in diastole, and patient's age were tabulated. Furthermore, right ventricular end-diastolic dimension was measured in 15 age-matched normal patients to
RESULTS
The etiologies for the pericardial effusions in our 76 patients are summarized in Table 1. In addition, their ages, right ventricular internal dimension in diastole, left ventricular internal dimension in diastole, and the size of their effusions are summarized. The 22 patients with heart disease and congestive heart failure includes five patients who had predominantly right-sided heart failure with relatively normal left ventricular volume and contraction factors and 17 patients who had
DISCUSSION
Our observations are consistent with the prior reports that heart disease, especially when accompanied by congestive heart failure, is the most prevalent abnormality associated with pericardial effusion in those patients who have been referred for echocardiography.1, 2 This prevalence is biased to some degree in that cardiologists are the main referral source to our noninvasive facility. When Vignola and colleagues9 analyzed the etiology of moderate and large pericardial effusions, the number
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
We gratefully acknowledge the technical assistance of Dale Gindlesperger.
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1988, Critical Care ClinicsIncidence and significance of pericardial effusion in acute myocardial infarction as determined by two-dimensional echocardiography
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Manuscript received October 15; revision accepted December 17.