Immediate effect of contrast medium injection on left ventricular volumes and ejection fraction. A study using metallic epicardial markers.

The immediate effect of contrast medium injection on left ventricular (LV) volume, stroke volume (SV) and ejection fraction (EF) was evaluated from postoperative LV biplane cineangiograms of 10 patients with 4-6 epicardial markers placed at the time of coronary artery surgery. After calibrating marker distances with respect to volume (r = 0.97-0.99) over one cardiac cycle for each patient, regression equations were used to compute LV volume from marker measurements for beats prior to, during and following injection. End-diastolic volumes (EDV) prior to injection ranged from 93-263 ml and did not change significantly with injection. End-systolic volumes (ESV) showed a mean decrease of 7.3 ml by beat 7 following injection; this was of borderline significance. Similarly, there was no significant change of SV or EF until beat 7 when there were small but significant increases of 6.4 ml and 0.04, respectively. The injection of moderate amounts of contrast in man does not cause significant changes in LV volume or EF through the sixth post-injection beat.