(Circulation. 2007;116:126-130.)
© 2007 American Heart Association, Inc.
Editorial |
From the Divisions of Cardiology, University of Washington, Seattle (D.S.O.); George Washington University, Washington, DC (J.F.P.); and the Cardiovascular Branch, National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Md (D.S.O., J.F.P.).
Correspondence to Jonathan F. Plehn, MD, Cardiovascular Branch, National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health, Building 10, CRC 5-5330, 10 Center Dr, Bethesda, MD 20892. E-mail plehnj{at}nhlbi.nih.gov
Key Words: Editorials coronary diseases echocardiography epidemiology imaging risk factors
| Introduction |
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Article p 143
| Unrecognized Myocardial Infarction |
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Because of practical considerations, epidemiological investigations have relied on the relatively inaccurate measures of patient testimony, medical history, and ECG for the diagnosis of prevalent or incident MI. Although ECG is an inexpensive, safe, and expedient medium, the test characteristics of ECG are problematic because of limitations in sensitivity and, to a lesser degree, specificity. When the diagnostic criteria are based on Q waves, sensitivity is limited as these are detected in only half of all infarctions documented by delayed gadolinium-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (Gd-MRI), the current imaging "gold standard" for MI diagnosis.5 The presence of a Q wave correlates best with overall size rather than with the transmural characteristics of the infarction,6,7 which leads to underdiagnosis of smaller infarcts. In addition, Cox8 demonstrated ECG reversion to normal of 5.6% of Q-wave infarctions over a 4-year period, which can further hamper sensitivity. Finally, most population-based studies fail to account for posterior infarcts in their diagnostic criteria by ignoring the development of right precordial R waves. Although less of an issue, the specificity of ECG MI diagnosis can be reduced by "pseudo-infarct patterns" found in conditions such as hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, emphysema, right ventricular hypertrophy, and infiltrative cardiomyopathy.9 The inclusion of repolarization abnormalities in diagnostic criteria will also serve to impair specificity. Despite these diagnostic vagaries, the ECG diagnosis of UMI will remain a part of the standard screening procedure simply because of its low cost and ease of use. However, imaging techniques that directly address cardiac pathology may be more predictive of outcome than ECG because they improve sensitivity without reducing specificity.
| Unrecognized Left Ventricular Dysfunction |
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Cardiovascular Health Study investigators have also performed qualitative assessment of 2-dimensional echoes and found borderline LV systolic function (estimated EF 45% to 54%) in 5.4% and impaired EF (<45%) in 2.6% of this elderly cohort (age >65 years).12 Both levels of impaired EF predicted cardiovascular (adjusted HRs 2.08 and 2.13, respectively) and all-cause death (1.25 and 1.83), with trends toward prognostic significance for incident nonfatal MI and stroke as well. In a similar assessment of qualitative EF estimates in the middle-aged Framingham cohort, Wang and coworkers13 reported that 3.0% of subjects without symptoms or history of CHF (6.0% of men and 0.8% of women) had an estimated EF <50%. When subjects with subjectively determined EF were partitioned into groups with either mild (40% to 50%) or moderate–severe (<40%) degrees of dysfunction, those with greater impairment had reduced rates of CHF-free survival (age- and sex-adjusted HRs of 3.9 and 8.5, respectively) as well as all-cause death (1.9 and 5.0). In fact, survival curves for moderate–severe ULVD approached those of subjects with symptomatic heart failure. These findings were similar to those observed in free-living subjects in Copenhagen, where the survival rate was reduced (HR 4.6 over 2 years of follow-up) in subjects with baseline EFs
40% regardless of whether they had heart failure symptoms.14
| The Strong Heart Study |
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The report by Cicala et al15 is noteworthy for several reasons. First, to our knowledge it is the first population-based study in which SMAs and global hypokinesis have been analyzed separately and apart from measures of overall systolic function. The result is that SMAs, and not global dysfunction, appear to predict incident vascular disease. Perhaps even more interesting is the notion that SMAs in a coronary distribution, presumably a result of CAD in most cases, do not appear to carry the same predictive power for cardiovascular morbidity as does a history of CAD. As discussed above, multiple studies have indicated that recognized and unrecognized Q-wave MIs carry similar prognoses in terms of risk for death. Thus it might also be expected that echocardiographic UMI might have the same ability to predict cardiovascular events as a history of CAD, but this was not the case in this investigation.
Probably the best explanation for the apparent limitation in predictive value displayed by echocardiography is that it is a more sensitive test for prevalent CAD than is ECG. As discussed above, Q-wave infarctions, which are the major predictive marker in most ECG studies, are known to represent larger infarcts, which in turn may be indicative of more severe coronary and other forms of vascular disease. Because subjects with Q-wave MIs at baseline were excluded from analysis, those with larger infarcts, presumably carrying a more ominous prognosis, may have been filtered out, thereby leaving a select population with only echocardiographic abnormalities resulting in a lower risk for cardiovascular events.
| Management of ULVD |
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ULVD Ascertainment
Wall motion assessment is one of the most challenging aspects of echocardiography. This fact is supported by the wide variation in normal EFs reported in patients without known cardiac disease. For example, whereas McDonagh et al16 reported a mean EF of 47% in a healthy, middle-aged Scottish population, Redfield et al17 noted an EF of 64% in a population of similar age without known cardiac disease. Limitation in accurate endocardial edge identification, particularly in apically acquired windows, has plagued epidemiologists for decades and is one reason that the antiquated, though often more reliable, M-mode technology continues to be used in population studies. The relatively recent advent of harmonic imaging, continued overall improvement in instrument quality, and the use of contrast media when endocardial definition requires enhancement will help to improve study accuracy in this area. With these advances, all of which are currently available in clinical labs, accurate 2-dimensional quantification of EF and improved identification of SMAs are possible on a routine basis and may be feasible on an epidemiological basis. In any event, qualitative assessment of reduced EF, especially in "borderline" cases, ideally should be accompanied by quantification, preferably by using a biplane method with carefully drawn endocardial borders. Failure to visualize such borders should trigger the implementation of contrast imaging for enhanced accuracy or implementation of an alternative imaging modality.
The discovery of definite ULVD, whether regional or global, should trigger an etiologic search, initially in the realm of CAD. In the case of asymptomatic SMAs, the presence of wall thinning, absence of systolic wall thickening, and enhanced reflectivity in a typical coronary distribution provide adequate evidence for prior infarction. If only regional hypokinesis is apparent, the presence of confounding conditions such as conduction defects, right ventricular volume overload, and postoperative changes should be excluded. Performance of one of the newer quantitative echocardiographic methods designed to assess strain, such as tissue Doppler strain rate imaging or myocardial speckle tracking,18 may also be of value. The ability of strain rate imaging to distinguish nontransmural from transmural MI and normal myocardium has been documented in both animal and clinical studies,19,20 and threshold values with excellent test characteristics have been documented by Zhang and colleagues.20
If echocardiographic studies are less than definitive or the technology is unavailable, confirmation of infarction may be obtained with delayed-enhancement Gd-MRI or possibly contrast-enhanced multislice computed tomography.21 Gd-MRI can accurately document transmural or even subendocardial infarction.5–7 In the case of global ventricular dysfunction, a cardiomyopathy workup should also include an initial investigation of possible CAD. Gd-MRI assessment may again prove useful, as there is evidence that in up to 87% of cases the technique can distinguish ischemic from nonischemic pathologies.22 Another reasonable approach would be to pursue conventional or computed tomographic angiography to search for triple-vessel or left main CAD. In the interest of avoiding radiation exposure, our preference is to pursue MRI first and to proceed with computed tomographic angiography only if there is evidence of infarction or if the results are not definitive.
Therapeutic Approaches
If evidence of UMI is observed in a single-vessel distribution and no additional wall motion abnormalities are detected, then there is no clear indication for further investigation and aggressive medical intervention with statins, antiplatelet agents, and probably β-blockade should be pursued. It might be argued that imaging-based stress testing should be included in this algorithm, but until there is evidence that treatment of what would be considered "silent myocardial ischemia" has an outcome benefit, this is not presently indicated.
In the case of unrecognized global LV dysfunction, if CAD is discovered, then invasive evaluation and possibly revascularization may be indicated on the basis of appropriate anatomy and evidence of myocardial viability. In any case, the initiation of angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibition or receptor blockade is supported by the results from the Studies of Left Ventricular Dysfunction (SOLVD) Prevention Trial, in which subjects without symptoms of heart failure and EFs <35% took almost 3 times as long to develop CHF symptoms when treated with enalapril compared with placebo-assigned controls (8.3 versus 22.3 months).23 It should be noted that subjects in the Prevention arm of SOLVD were known to have existing cardiac disease, although they were not currently being treated with heart failure medications. Furthermore, there was an EF-dependent treatment effect, and treatment-assigned subjects with EFs in the 33% to 35% range received a benefit of only borderline significance. Thus, it is not certain that similar treatment of asymptomatic subjects screened for ULVD with mild or moderate EF reduction would result in outcome benefits equivalent to those seen in SOLVD.
Epidemiological Applications
Finally, it is unknown whether advanced imaging technologies that pose no radiation risk should play a major role in selective population risk screening. Enhanced detection of CAD with the use of tissue Doppler strain rate imaging or myocardial speckle tracking has yet to be reported in an epidemiological setting. Early strides are, however, being made in the epidemiological application of MRI. A recent report by Kwong and coworkers24 indicated that Gd-MRI evidence of even small amounts of myocardial necrosis conferred increased risks for major adverse cardiac events and cardiovascular death (HR 8.3 and 10.9) when compared with the presence of SMAs (HR 4.8 and 6.2) in subjects with suspected but undocumented CAD. The ongoing Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) has already documented subtle abnormalities of ventricular function related to carotid intimal thickness that may represent subclinical evidence of CAD.25 Finally, Gd-MRI is being used to assess prevalence and prognosis of UMI in a subgroup of the Aging Gene/Environment Susceptibility (AGES)–Reykjavik Study. Although the accuracy of technology such as this in detecting ULVD and UMI could lead to a quantum leap in cardiovascular risk assessment, only trials targeted at the treatment of high-risk subjects with ULVD can truly determine whether the benefits of advanced imaging implementation in population screening will justify the significant costs.
| Acknowledgments |
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None.
| Footnotes |
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| References |
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