Why the study?
The study was conducted to share a 3 months' echo lab experience and describe the scope of clinical cases diagnosed at a tertiary cardiac institute.
Hypertensive heart disease is the predominant echocardiographic diagnosis at a tertiary cardiac center in Tanzania, affecting 62% of referred patients.
Hypertensive heart disease predominates echo diagnoses at this center; leaves open need for broader studies to guide prevention.
Objective: Echocardiography is a useful noninvasive tool for the diagnosis and evaluation of cardiac diseases. This study aims to share our 3 months’ experience in our echo lab as well as the scope of clinical cases diagnosed at our institute. Methods: This is a cross-sectional observational study conducted at the Jakaya Kikwete Cardiac Institute, in Dar-es-salaam, Tanzania between February 2020 to May 2020. This was performed with the Siemens Accuson S-300 machine using two dimensional, M-mode, colour flow and tissue Doppler protocols. Results: 1992 consecutive patients, 857 males and 1135 females, were examined during the study period. Their ages ranged from 27 to 84 years within a mean of 55±13 years. 1236 (62%) had left ventricular hypertrophy and diastolic dysfunction as features of hypertensive heart disease, 145 (7.2%) had dilated cardiomyopathy, 87 (4.4%) had ischemic cardiomyopathy, 54 (2.7%) had Rheumatic heart disease, also we had 450 (22.6%) who had a normal echo. Conclusion: Hypertensive heart disease was the immense echocardiographic diagnosis at our institute and is the most significant non-communicable diseases responsible for increased morbidity and mortality among our patients in Tanzania. Furthermore, a lot of effort needs to be done to increase awareness, prevention, treatment and drug compliance for hypertension to combat the complications.
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Kimambo et al. (2020) studied this question.
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