What are the apexcardiogram patterns in patients with altered left ventricular contraction?
The apexcardiogram can distinguish four distinct patterns of altered left ventricular contraction, which correlate with the presence of aneurysms and ventricular asynergy.
The apexcardiogram was analyzed in 41 patients with an altered pattern of left ventricular contraction. Four types were distinguished: type I, an early sustained systolic bulge which occurred in 12 patients, all of whom had large aneurysms and large enddiastolic volumes; type II, a bulge confined to midsystole which occurred in 13 patients, 11 of whom had some form of ventricular asynergy; type III, a late or end-systolic bulge which occurred in 12 patients, seven of whom had ventricular asynergy; type IV, a prominent spike during diastolic filling which occurred in four patients who had large zones of ventricular asynergy.
Lane et al. (Sat,) studied this question.