Echocardiographic evaluation of the right ventricle provides significant prognostic utility for risk assessment and follow-up in patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension.
Does echocardiography provide prognostic utility in the risk assessment of patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension?
Echocardiography may have significant prognostic utility and a role in repeated assessments for risk stratification in patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension, despite its limited role in current guidelines.
Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) is characterized by an insult in the pulmonary vasculature, with subsequent right ventricular (RV) adaptation to the increased afterload that ultimately leads to RV failure. The awareness of the importance of RV function in PAH has increased considerably because right heart failure is the predominant cause of death in PAH patients. Given its wide availability and reduced cost, echocardiography is of paramount importance in the evaluation of the right heart in PAH. Several echocardiographic parameters have been shown to have prognostic implications in PAH; however, the role of echocardiography in the risk assessment of the PAH patient is limited under the current guidelines. This review discusses the echocardiographic evaluation of the RV in PAH and during therapy, and its prognostic implications, as well as the potential significant role of repeated echocardiographic assessment in the follow-up of patients with PAH.
Farmakis et al. (Sat,) conducted a review in Pulmonary arterial hypertension. Echocardiography was evaluated. Echocardiographic evaluation of the right ventricle provides significant prognostic utility for risk assessment and follow-up in patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension.
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