Modified myocardial 2D-strain parameters in stressed right ventricles of fetuses

Introduction: 2D-strain imaging based on speckle tracking is a new non-invasive, angle independent ultrasonic technique able to quantify regional myocardial deformation properties. Regional systolic strain is showing a strong relation to stroke volume and ejection fraction. Up to now there is no experience with this technique in fetal hearts. Methods: We matched 17 fetuses with right ventricular stress due to specific congenital heart defects (7 TOF; 2 HLHS, 2 AVSD, 2 dyspl. PV) or stress (3 RV-hypertrophy, 1 thrombus in DA) with 17 normal controls. After segmentation of a transverse four-chamber-view-raw-data-l…