Smartphone-based AI-enhanced ECG Detection of Left Ventricular Systolic Dysfunction in Chagas Disease: External Validation in a Resource-limited Setting

Chagas disease (ChD) is a largely neglected tropical disease with an estimated global prevalence of 6–7 million infected individuals, most of whom reside in Latin America.1 The growing migration of Latin American communities to other world regions is shifting the global prevalence of the disease to previously unaffected regions,2,3 where it often remains undiagnosed owing to low clinical awareness.4 Untreated, the natural course of the disease may go silent in the majority of infected individuals, but 20%–30% will develop chronic Chagas cardiomyopathy (CCC), a progressive and often arrhythmogenic form associated with heart failure.