Why the study?
Radiation exposure of the chest carries a significant risk of cardiovascular disease, and radiation pericarditis often follows a long asymptomatic course where late diagnosis reduces quality of life and raises mortality.
Careful history taking and timely diagnosis of radiation-induced pericardial disease are essential in patients with prior chest radiation to prevent decreased quality of life and cardiovascular mortality.
Supports monitoring for pericardial injury after chest radiation; hypothesis-generating for variants and management strategies.
Radiation exposure of the chest is associated with a significant risk of subsequent development of cardiovascular diseases. Associated cardiovascular injuries include pericardial disease, coronary artery disease, valvular disease, conduction disease, cardiomyopathy, and vasculopathy. This article presents the development of different variants of pericardial radiation damage, methods of diagnosis and treatment of these complications. Radiation damage to the pericardium can manifest as acute pericarditis, effusion with tamponade or without cardiac tamponade, effusion-constrictive or classic constrictive pericarditis. Algorithms for the diagnosis and treatment of patients with radiation pericarditis in connection with a long asymptomatic course in a number of patients deserve special attention. Careful history taking and identifying prior radiotherapy is important in this category of patients. Untimely diagnosis and late treatment of these complications leads to a decrease in the quality of life of patients and increases the risk of cardiovascular mortality.
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Емелина et al. (2019) studied this question.
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