Cardiology Journal 2008, tom 15, nr 2

Subcostal planes allow demonstration of the entire right ventricular cavity and are frequently used in patients with congenital heart disease; however, their clinical utility in the evaluation of systemic right ventricular function after atrial switch procedure for complete transposition has never been verified in adolescent and adult patients...

The impact of radiofrequency current ablation (RFCA) on left ventricular (LV) systolic and diastolic function in patients with atrioventricular nodal re-entrant tachycardia (AVNRT) is not well established yet...

Microalbuminuria is considered a major risk factor predisposing to cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. Microalbuminuria levels in patients with or without diabetes have been associated with a higher risk of chronic heart failure (HF). However, there are limited data regarding prevalence of microalbuminuria in chronic heart failure and its prognostic value...

Analysis of high gain, signal-averaged (SA) ECG is an accepted method evaluating abnormalities of atrial repolarization — the presence of late potentials (ALP) — predictive for atrial arrhythmias. Recently it has been proven that the location of atrial leads has an influence on atrial activation and modifies the risk of atrial arrhythmias...

In recent years, increased serum immunoglobulin E (IgE) concentration in patients with cardiovascular diseases has been generating more and more interest. It is as yet unknown, however, if the increased IgE level is a marker of future coronary incidents and whether it may be regarded as an ischemic heart disease risk factor, or if it is indicative of the participation of antibodies in an inflammatory reaction to tissue damage...

Spatial dispersion of repolarization in the form of transmural, trans-septal and apico-basal dispersion of repolarization creates voltage gradients that inscribe the J wave and T wave of the ECG. Amplification of this spatial dispersion of repolarization (SDR) underlies the development of life-threatening ventricular arrhythmias associated with inherited or acquired ion channelopathies giving rise to the long QT, short QT and Brugada syndromes (BrS)...

This letter is in response to the article by Riera et al. entitled “Early repolarization variant: Epidemiological aspects, mechanism, and differential diagnosis” The article is available online as in press article Cardiology Journal 2008 (vol. 15).With much interest I read the review article by Riera et al. [1] in which they comprehensively described the epidemiological aspects, mechanism, and differential diagnosis of early repolarization variant (ERV). The differential diagnosis of ERV with ST segment elevation syndromes and the J-wave syndrome was really useful to me as a clinician and as a researcher. However, I have few comments about Figure 5 in the article...