Echocardiographic assessment of left ventricular function in Duchenne's muscular dystrophy.

Left ventricular function was assessed echocardiographically in 13 children with Duchenne's muscular dystrophy. Ejection fraction, mean velocity of circumferential fibre shortening, normalised left ventricular posterior wall velocity, maximal systolic endocardial velocity, and maximal diastolic endocardial velocity were determined manually by measuring.directly from the echocardiographic tracings. The echocardiograms were then digitised and results computed in order to study the peak rates of change of dimension, the peak lengthening rates, the peak shortening rates, and the time relation between the mitral valve and left ventricular posterior wall movement in early diastole.