Rest contrast echocardiography unmasks hidden wall motion abnormalities
in patients with chest pain. A case series and review of pertinent
literature.
Abstract
We present a case series of three patients that underwent myocardial
contrast echocardiography (MCE) in the setting of recent chest pain, as
paradigmatic examples of the usefulness of contrast-echocardiography
with very-low mechanical index imaging in the context of rest wall
motion assessment. Moreover, we analysed the pertinent literature about
the use of rest MCE in the context of chest pain of unknown origin,
showing its diagnostic and prognostic impact. We think that MCE could
play a key role in detecting chest pain subtended by previously unknown
CAD. For example, in pts without significant ECG modifications or in
whom high sensitivity troponins show only borderline increase (still
below the upper limit) or have no clearly significant delta. In such
cases the more sensitive evaluation of WM powered by MCE could add
diagnostic information, above all in pts with severe CAD but apparently
normal WM at standard echocardiography.