title: "Pulmonary tongue" a right ventricle phase abnormality in muga studies in patients with pulmonary hypertension.
abstract: Pulmonary hypertension (PH) produces strain followed by hypertrophy and later dilatation of the right ventricle (RV) and pulmonary artery. The signs and symptoms are nonspecific. There is a need for a noninvasive sensitive way to diagnose PH. The purpose of this study is to evaluate phase abnormalities in radionuclide MUGA studies of patients with referred diagnosis of PH. In a retrospective analysis of 44 patients who had a radionuclide multigated study (MUGA) and contrast ventriculography (CV), 19 had high mean pulmonary pressure (over 20 mmHg) and a high pulmonary vascular resistance index (over 2.0). In 15 patients, a delayed phase segment in the RV corresponding to the pulmonary infundibulum and pulmonary conus was noted "The Pulmonary Tongue" sign (PT), 12 had PH (True positive) and 3 did not (false positive) on CV. No PT was seen in the remaining 29 patients, only 7 of them had PH (False negative). The sensitivity, specificity and accuracy of the PT sign in detecting PH was 80%, 72% and 77% respectively. The number of patients was too small to calculate the correlation of the grade of PT with the severity of PH. We conclude that "The Pulmonary Tongue" sign on a MUGA study is clinically useful in detecting PH.
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D005260:Female; D006321:Heart / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000503:physiopathology; D006352:Heart Ventricles / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D006801:Humans; D006976:Hypertension, Pulmonary / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000473:pathology / Q000503:physiopathology; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011877:Radionuclide Imaging