title: Validation of longitudinal peak systolic strain by speckle tracking echocardiography with visual assessment and myocardial perfusion SPECT in patients with regional asynergy.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Automated function imaging (AFI) is a recently developed method of calculating the longitudinal peak systolic strains (LS) of the regional left ventricular (LV) wall using speckle tracking echocardiography and displaying them on a single bull's-eye map. The feasibility of AFI in patients with regional LV wall motion abnormalities caused by myocardial infarction (MI) was evaluated by comparison with visual assessment and myocardial perfusion single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT).
  
  
  RESULTS
  Segmental LS was measured by AFI in 60 patients with MI (67 ± 11 years) and 58 controls (71 ± 9 years). Wall thickening (WT) was measured by SPECT in 20 patients with MI. There was a strong positive linear relationship between the wall motion score index by expert visual assessment and global LS. The receiver-operating characteristic analysis revealed the best cutoff value of 11% < LS to identify hypokinetic segments. The overall accuracy of wall motion scoring by LS in the 2,006 segments was 96.8% (κ = 0.90) compared with visual assessment. The correlation coefficient between LS and WT was R² = 0.65 in the 340 segments.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Assessment of LV regional asynergy by AFI showed good agreement with visual and SPECT assessments. AFI is clinically useful for quantitative assessment of LV regional wall motion abnormalities.
authors.affiliation: Department of Cardiovascular Medicine, Institute of Health Biosciences, The University of Tokushima Graduate School, Tokushima, Japan.
authors.forename: Kenya
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kusunose
authors.forename: Hirotsugu
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Yamada
authors.forename: Susumu
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Nishio
authors.forename: Yukio
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Mizuguchi
authors.forename: Masahito
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Choraku
authors.forename: Yasuhiro
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Maeda
authors.forename: Shinobu
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Hosokawa
authors.forename: Nobuo
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Yamazaki
authors.forename: Noriko
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Tomita
authors.forename: Toshiyuki
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Niki
authors.forename: Koji
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Yamaguchi
authors.forename: Kunihiko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Koshiba
authors.forename: Takeshi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Soeki
authors.forename: Tetsuzo
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Wakatsuki
authors.forename: Masashi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Akaike
authors.forename: Masataka
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Sata
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D000465:Algorithms; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D015150:Echocardiography, Doppler; D005240:Feasibility Studies; D006801:Humans; D007090:Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted; D007564:Japan; D008875:Middle Aged; D009200:Myocardial Contraction; D009203:Myocardial Infarction / Q000150:complications* / Q000503:physiopathology; D055414:Myocardial Perfusion Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D015588:Observer Variation; D011237:Predictive Value of Tests; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D015899:Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon; D018487:Ventricular Dysfunction, Left / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000209:etiology / Q000503:physiopathology; D016277:Ventricular Function, Left