Evaluation of left-ventricular dysfunction in chronic obstructive pulmonary disease by speckle tracking based strain analysis

Background: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and congestive heart failure represent two disease entities of growing global burden that share common etiological features. Against this background, we aimed to identify the degree of left-ventricular (LV) dysfunction in COPD. Methods: A total of 86 patients (64.8 ± 10.2yrs, 53.5% male) with spirometric-confirmed COPD were screened for LV heart failure by use of echocardiography and two-dimensional strain analysis. Results: Distribution analysis revealed 9.3%, 45.3%, 9.3% and 36.0% of patients to be in GOLD stages A, B, C and D, respectively. Mean FEV1 av…