Pocket-size echocardiograph - a valuable tool for non-experts or just a portable device for echocardiographers?
Section snippets
INTRODUCTION
Echocardiographic examination is universally accepted as a non-invasive, side-effect-free procedure, providing a “visual supplement” to physical examination, enabling quick and thorough assessment of patient's cardiovascular status. Moreover, in emergency situations it enables immediate bedside evaluation of patients' status. However, conventional high-end systems, even though designed as mobile, in reality prove difficult to transport. The necessity for bedside examination, results in a
Study population
The study group consisted of 90 unselected patients (63 men, 27 women; mean age: 64±14 years) admitted or referred to the cardiac intensive care unit and 30 patients from an outpatient clinic referred for scheduled echocardiographic examination (21 men, 9 women; mean age: 62±17 years) by their treating doctor. Main reasons for mentioned referral were hypertension, stable angina, suspected valve disease, monitoring of patients suffering from chronic heart failure, heart function assessment prior
Duration of bTTE and quality of images
Mean time of bTTE in groups A, B, C and D was 6.3±1.5 minutes, 5.4±1.1 minutes, 2.8±1.2 minutes and 4.7±1.1 minutes, respectively (all differences observed between groups were statistically significant).
The quality of images in groups A and B were described as acceptable in 39 (65%) patients, good in 20 (33.3%) patients, whereas 1 (1.7%) patient (from group A) was excluded from analysis due to student's inability to acquire images of sufficient quality. In group D, acceptable and good quality
DISCUSSION
Our study is one of the first to present results concerning application of a pocket-size echocardiograph by novice echocardiographers after completion of a brief training program. [4, 5] The main finding is that pocket-size echocardiograph enables them to detect major abnormalities with an acceptable diagnostic value, which increases with the number of performed examinations. When used by an experienced sonographer the pocket echocardiograph allows for reliable basic bedside examinations.
The
CONCLUSIONS
Pocket-size echocardiograph enables an expert echocardiographer to perform reliable basic bedside examinations. When used by briefly trained medical student, it provides an acceptable diagnostic value regarding the detection of basic structural and functional findings with notable learning curve effect. Further studies are required to address the issue of training of non-experts in echocardiographic examinations with pocket-size systems.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The results of this study were presented at ESC Congress 2010 (European Society of Cardiology Congress, 28 Aug 2010 - 01 Sep 2010, Stockholm – Sweden).
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