• Vedat Davutoglu, Ahmet Celik, Mehmet Aksoy, Yusuf Sezen, Serdar Soydinc, and Nurullah Gunay.
• Department of Cardiology, School of Medicine, Sahinbey Medical Center, Gaziantep University, Guneykent mah. Besyuzevler sitesi 7.Blok. Daire: 10, TR-27310-Sahinbey/Gaziantep, Turkey. davutoglu@gantep.edu.tr
• Eur. J. Heart Fail. 2005 Jun 1; 7 (4): 532-6.

BackgroundA noninvasive marker of disease severity and presence of symptoms is required in patients with chronic rheumatic valve disease (RVD).AimsWe sought to test the utility of measuring of N-terminal pro-B type natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) in chronic phase RVD. We also evaluated whether echocardiographic measures are interrelated with NT-proBNP levels.MethodsThe study comprised 92 patients with RVD (mean age of 40+/-14 years) and 50 age/gender-matched control subjects. Functional status was assessed. Detailed echocardiographic examination was performed and mitral valve score was estimated. Venous blood samples were taken for measuring the level of NT-proBNP.ResultsThe plasma levels of NT-proBNP rose with increasing severity of mitral valve stenosis (p<0.001), increasing severity of mitral valve score (p<0.001), increasing severity of clinical symptom (p<0.001), increasing severity of mitral regurgitation (p<0.013), presence of mitral valve calcification (p<0.001), presence of tricuspid valve stenosis (p<0.001), increasing severity of tricuspid regurgitation (p<0.011), presence of aortic stenosis (p=0.043), decreasing left ventricular ejection fraction (p<0.001), presence of left atrial thrombus (p=0.0019), and with increasing left atrium dimensions (p=0.002).ConclusionNT-proBNP levels in patients with chronic RVD are a potential marker of disease severity and correlates with symptoms.

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