title: Value of QT dispersion in evaluating spatial dispersion of ventricular repolarization during acute myocardial ischemia.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To study the value of epicardial QT interval dispersion in predicting ischemia-induced heterogeneity of ventricular repolarization.
  
  
  METHODS
  Ischemia was produced by total occlusion of the obtuse branch of the circumflex coronary artery in seven open-chest sheep. A 64-channel electrocardiogram (ECG) was acquired from the epicardium before and after coronary artery occlusion. Wavelet transformation was used to determine the characteristic points of the epicardial ECGs, and to measure the QT interval and activation-recovery interval (ARI) and their dispersions.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The average QT interval and ARI from the epicardial ECG were not changed by acute myocardial ischemia (P=0.07 and P=0.13, respectively). QT dispersion remained unchanged during ischemia (P=0.17), whereas ARI dispersion was significantly increased by acute ischemia (59.9+/-24.0 ms versus 126.3+/-32.1 ms, P<0.001).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These findings indicate that epicardial QT dispersion is less sensitive than ARI dispersion in estimating repolarization heterogeneity induced by acute myocardial ischemia.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biophysics, School of Physics, Nankai University, Tianjin, People's Republic of China, and.
authors.forename: C Y
authors.initials: CY
authors.lastname: Li
authors.forename: L Z
authors.initials: LZ
authors.lastname: Jia
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Wang