Functional recovery of cardiomyopathy induced by atrial tachycardia in children: Insight from cardiac strain imaging.
AIM
To evaluate systolic and diastolic cardiac function in children who had cardiomyopathy induced by ectopic atrial tachycardia (EAT).


METHODS
Twenty-two pediatric patients who had cardiomyopathy induced by EAT and 25 age-matched controls were recruited in this case-control study. The patients were examined after rhythm control and normalization of their left ventricular systolic function. Different echocardiographic modalities including tissue Doppler imaging and two-dimension speckle tracking echocardiography were utilized to assess the ventricular and atrial function.


RESULTS
The patients' median age was 51 months (interquartile range: 28.5-84 months). The median time interval required for normalization of left ventricular ejection fraction (EF) among patients was 1.5 months (interquartile range: 1.5-2.12 months). Compared to controls, patients had a significantly higher median left ventricular myocardial performance index (MPI) at the interventricular septum (0.44 vs. 0.38, p = .001) and left ventricular lateral wall (0.46 vs. 0.32, p = .0001). The median right ventricular MPI of the patients' group was significantly higher when compared to the control group (0.34 vs. 0.26, p = .0001). The median right atrial (RA) reservoir function in patients was significantly reduced compared to controls (30% vs. 36.63%, p = .007).


CONCLUSIONS
Shortly after rhythm normalization and restoration of left ventricular EF, using tissue Doppler imaging and two-dimension speckle tracking echocardiography, children who had cardiomyopathy induced by EAT continue to have left ventricular diastolic dysfunction, right ventricular dysfunction, and reduced RA reservoir function.
['Dohain|Ahmed M|AM|', 'Lotfy|Wael|W|', 'Abdelmohsen|Gaser|G|', 'Sobhy|Rodina|R|', 'Abdelaziz|Osama|O|', 'Elsaadany|Marwa|M|', 'Abdelsalam|Mohamed H|MH|', 'Ibrahim|Hossam|H|']
cardiomyopathy ectopic atrial tachycardia speckle tracking echocardiography tissue doppler echocardiography