We aimed to evaluate levels of amino-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptid (NT-proBNP) in prediction of left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) in heart failure patients. Prospective study on consecutive patients with symptoms and signs of heart failure was performed. Blood samples for NT

Background—Patients with severe aortic stenosis and reduced left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) have a poor prognosis with conservative therapy but a high operative mortality when treated surgically. Recently, transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) has emerged as an alternative

Background and Objectives: The postoperative outcomes of patients with severe aortic regurgitation (AR) and a low ejection fraction (EF) were elucidated. Subjects and Methods: The study group consisted of 201 consecu-tive patients that underwent corrective surgery for isolated AR. The clinical data

Hypertension (HTN) is a persistent, nonphysiologic elevation in blood pressure; it is defined as (1) having a systolic blood pressure (SBP) of 140 mm Hg or greater; (2) having a diastolic blood pressure (DBP) of 90 mm Hg or greater; (3) taking antihypertensive medication; or (4) having been told at least twice by a physician or other health professional that one has HTN. According to WHO, almost 1 billion people had uncontrolled HTN worldwide in 2008. The American Heart Association (AHA) estimates that 41 % of the U.S. population will have a diagnosis of HTN by 2030, an increase of 8.4 % from 2012 estimates. The prevalence of HTN increases from 7.3 % in people aged 18–39 to 32.4 % in people aged 40–59 and 65.0 % in those older than 59 years. Data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES) show a higher prevalence of HTN in men than in women until age 45 years and similar rates thereafter. The sobering reality for those who treat patients with HTN is that more than one-half of patients (53.5%) are inadequately controlled, and more than one-third (39.4%) are unaware that they have HTN (CDC 2012). A review of NHANES data shows that the percentage of hypertensive adults with optimal blood pressure increased from 13 % to 19 % from 2003 to 2012, whereas mean SBP decreased during the same time (Yoon 2015). However, with recent changes made to HTN guidelines (see the next section), the prevalence of uncontrolled HTN may be lower than these estimates (Sakhuja 2015). The improve-ments in HTN control among the U.S. population have correlated with the increased use of antihypertensive drugs, particularly combination therapy (Gu 2012).

Global left ventricle chamber function in obese patients is assessed, most commonly, by means of the ejection fraction. The preferred noninvasive modality for evaluating regional wall motion and overall ventricular performance is usually color-flow Doppler transthoracic echocardiography. The aim

Left ventricular ejection fractions (L VEF) were measured after injection of a bolus of Tc-99m gluconate. These ejection fractions were then compared to values obtained by contrast angiography. The importance of such parameters as delivery of the bolus, collimation, projection used, and parameters

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”Visually estimated left ventricular ejection fraction by echocardiography is closely correlated with formal quantitative methods."

The calculation of the left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) is dependent upon the accurate measurement of diastolic and systolic left ventricular volumes. Although breath-hold cine magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) allows coverage of the whole cardiac cycle with an excellent time resolution

SUMMARY Three commercially available computer programs (a semiautomatic method, a manual method, and a regional method) were used to calculate left ventricular ejection fraction from the equilibrium multiple gated radionuclide ventriculograms obtained from 24 normal male subjects and 20 men