Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography : official publication of the American Society of Echocardiography
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J Am Soc Echocardiogr · Jul 1997
Normal echocardiographic characteristics of the Sorin Bicarbon bileaflet prosthetic heart valve in the mitral and aortic positions.
Doppler echocardiographic characteristics of normally functioning Sorin Bicarbon prostheses were prospectively assessed in 226 consecutive patients (135 male and 91 female patients, mean age 61 +/- 10 years) with 233 valves in the mitral (n = 67) and aortic (n = 166) positions whose function was considered normal by clinical and echocardiographic evaluation. Patterns of "normal" transprosthetic leakage were assessed with transthoracic echocardiography in all valves and with transesophageal echocardiography in six selected mitral valve prostheses. For the mitral valve prostheses, we found that peak and mean gradient, as well as pressure half-time, were not significantly different in either the 25 or the 31 mm valves (median values from 15 to 10 mm Hg, from 4 to 4 mm Hg, and from 70 to 83 ms; p = Not significant for all). ⋯ Furthermore, effective prosthetic aortic valve area correlated better than peak and mean gradients with prosthetic size (r = 0.76, r = -0.45, and r = -0.39, respectively). On transthoracic study, 109 patients (66%) showed minimal transprosthetic leakage. These normal values, obtained in a large number of patients with normofunctioning mitral and aortic Sorin Bicarbon valves, may help to identify Sorin Bicarbon prosthesis dysfunction.
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J Am Soc Echocardiogr · Jul 1997
Case ReportsTransesophageal echocardiography in the presence of left atrial calcification.
Calcification of left atrial walls is a rare finding that has been reported to hamper visibility of intracardiac structures during transesophageal echocardiography because of the posterior location of the left atrium. We report a case of severe mitral stenosis associated with heavy left atrial calcification in which we could obtain good quality transesophageal imaging in spite of such a calcification. We conclude that calcification of left atrial walls does not necessarily imply a limitation of transesophageal echocardiography.