The long-term prognostic value of the ST depression criteria for ischemia recommended in the universal definition of myocardial infarction in 43,661 veterans

Three-Dimensional Visualization of Myocardial Ischemia Based on the Standard Twelve-Lead Electrocardiogram

A novel method was proposed for transforming the ischemic information in the 12-lead electrocardiogram (ECG) into the pseudo-color pattern displayed on a 3D heart model based on the projection of a ST injury vector in this study. The projection of the ST injury vector at a point on the heart surface was used for identifying the presence of myocardial ischemia by the difference between the projection value and the detection threshold. Supposing that myocardial ischemia was uniform and continuous, the location and range of myocardial ischemia could be accurately calculated and visually displayed in a color-encoding way. The diagnoses of the same patient were highly consistent (kappa coefficient k = 0.9030) between the proposed method used by ordinary people lacking medical knowledge and the standard 12-lead ECG used by experienced cardiologists. In addition, the diagnostic accuracy of the proposed method was further confirmed by the coronary angiography. The results of this study provide a new way to promote the development of the 3D visualization of the standard 12-lead ECG, which has a great help for inexperienced doctors or ordinary family members in their diagnosis of patients with myocardial ischemia.

Examining QRS amplitude criteria for electrocardiographic left ventricular hypertrophy in recommendations for screening criteria in athletes

BACKGROUND

Current guidelines for interpretation of the ECGs of athletes recommend that isolated R and S wave amplitudes that exceed traditional criteria for left ventricular hypertrophy be accepted as a physiological response to exercise training. This is based on training and echocardiographic studies but not on long term follow up. Demonstration of the prognostic characteristics of the amplitude criteria in a non-athletic population could support the current guidelines.

OBJECTIVE

To evaluate the prognostic value of the R and S wave voltage criteria for electrocardiographic left ventricular hypertrophy (ECG-LVH) in an ambulatory clinical population.

SUBJECTS AND METHODS

The target population consisted of 20,903 ambulatory subjects who had ECGs recorded between 1987 and 1999 and were followed for cardiovascular death until 2013. During the mean follow up of 17 years, there were 881 cardiovascular deaths.

RESULTS

The mean age was 43 ± 10, 91% were male and 16% were African American. Of the 2482 (12%) subjects who met the Sokolow-Lyon criteria, 241 (1.2%) subjects with left ventricular (LV) strain had an HR of 5.4 (95% CI 4.1-7.2, p<0.001), while 2241 (11%) subjects without strain had an HR of 1.4 (95% CI 1.2-1.8, p<0.001). Of the 4836 (23%) subjects who met the Framingham voltage criteria, 350 (2%) subjects with LV strain had an HR of 5.1 (95% CI 4.0-6.5, p<0.001), while 4486 (22%) subjects without strain had an HR of 1.1 (95% CI 0.9-1.3, p=0.26). The individual components of the Romhilt-Estes had HRs ranging from 1.4 to 3.6, with only the voltage component not being significant (HR 1.1, 95% CI 0.9-1.5, p=0.35).

CONCLUSIONS

This study demonstrates that the R and S wave voltage criteria components of most of the original classification schema for electrocardiographic left ventricular hypertrophy are not predictive of CV mortality. Our findings support the current guidelines for electrocardiographic screening of athletes.