Journal of cardiovascular medicine
-
J Cardiovasc Med (Hagerstown) · Sep 2008
Case ReportsTransient trifascicular block complicating myocardial contusion after blunt chest trauma: a case report.
Cardiac contusion may be frequently found in patients with blunt chest trauma, and it presents clinically as a spectrum of injuries of varying severity, including transient disorders of impulse formation and propagation. A rare observation of transient trifascicular block in a previously fit 32-year-old man involved in a car accident is reported. The importance of ECG monitoring and biochemical assessment of markers to unmask myocardial contusion is discussed.
-
J Cardiovasc Med (Hagerstown) · Sep 2008
Transient left ventricular apical ballooning syndrome: a 4-year experience.
Transient left ventricular apical ballooning syndrome, primarily described in Japanese patients, has been recently recognized outside Japan also. Aim of this study is to elucidate incidence and clinical features of left ventricular apical ballooning syndrome in a tertiary-care hospital in northeastern Italy. ⋯ Left ventricular apical ballooning syndrome is a novel syndrome with a nonnegligible incidence, a clinical presentation mimicking acute myocardial infarction and a favorable outcome. The present data confirm a higher prevalence in women and the frequent association with emotional stress. The differential diagnosis with acute myocardial infarction at presentation is still puzzling, and only ECG findings in conjunction with echocardiography and coronary angiography are so far diagnostics.
-
J Cardiovasc Med (Hagerstown) · Aug 2008
Comparative StudyReduction of myocardial blood flow reserve in idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy without overt heart failure and its relation with functional indices: an echo-Doppler and positron emission tomography study.
Myocardial blood flow during pharmacological vasodilatation is depressed in patients with idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy even the in absence of overt heart failure; the extent of myocardial blood flow abnormalities is not predictable by left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) and diastolic dimensions. ⋯ In idiopathic dilated cardiomyopathy patients without overt heart failure, the extent of myocardial blood flow reserve impairment is related to dP/dt but not to more classical indices of left ventricular function.
-
J Cardiovasc Med (Hagerstown) · Jul 2008
Case ReportsMajor rectus abdominis hematoma complicating low molecular weight heparin therapy.
The use of low molecular weight heparin sometimes leads to major life threatening complications, such as acute abdominal haemorrhages. We report two cases of major haematoma of rectus abdominis. Computed tomography was very helpful to confirm the diagnosis in these cases.
-
J Cardiovasc Med (Hagerstown) · Jul 2008
Case ReportsUnusual evolutionary electrocardiogram pattern in a white patient with apical hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.
We report the case of a 85-year-old white woman diagnosed with apical hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, in whom we observed an unusual progression of initial T waves inversion to a nearly normal electrocardiogram (EKG) to giant negative T waves and back to a nearly normal EKG.