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Diagnosis and assessment of dilated cardiomyopathy: a guideline protocol from the British Society of Echocardiography

Echo Research & Practice volume 4, pages G1–G13 (2017)Cite this article

Abstract

Heart failure (HF) is a debilitating and life-threatening condition, with 5-year survival rate lower than breast or prostate cancer. It is the leading cause of hospital admission in over 65s, and these admissions are projected to rise by more than 50% over the next 25 years. Transthoracic echocardiography (TTE) is the first-line step in diagnosis in acute and chronic HF and provides immediate information on chamber volumes, ventricular systolic and diastolic function, wall thickness, valve function and the presence of pericardial effusion, while contributing to information on aetiology. Dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) is the third most common cause of HF and is the most common cardiomyopathy. It is defined by the presence of left ventricular dilatation and left ventricular systolic dysfunction in the absence of abnormal loading conditions (hypertension and valve disease) or coronary artery disease sufficient to cause global systolic impairment. This document provides a practical approach to diagnosis and assessment of dilated cardiomyopathy that is aimed at the practising sonographer.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Cardiology, Nottingham University Hospital, Nottingham, UK

    Thomas Mathew

  2. Cardiology, Papworth Hospital, Cambridge, UK

    Lynne Williams

  3. University Health Board, Cwm Taf Health Board, Abercynon, UK

    Govardhan Navaratnam

  4. Cardiac Services Directorate, Papworth Hospital, Cambridge, UK

    Bushra Rana

  5. Cardiothoracic, University Hospital of Wales, Cardiff, UK

    Richard Wheeler

  6. Cardiology, Portsmouth Hospitals NHS Trust, Queen Alexandra Hospital, Portsmouth, UK

    Katherine Collins & Richard Jones

  7. Cardiology Department, Colchester Hospital NHS Trust, Colchester, UK

    Allan Harkness

  8. Centre for Cardiovascular Imaging, University College London, London, UK

    Dan Knight

  9. Cardiology, Kings College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, London, UK

    Kevin O’Gallagher

  10. Research Institute for Sports and Exercise Physiology, Liverpool John Moores University, Liverpool, UK

    David Oxborough

  11. Cardiology Department, West Suffolk Hospital NHS Trust, Bury St Edmonds, UK

    Liam Ring

  12. Cardiac Ultrasound, Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, Leeds, UK

    Julie Sandoval

  13. Cardiology Department, University Hospital South Manchester, Manchester, UK

    Martin Stout

  14. Cardiology, Royal Liverpool University Hospital, Liverpool, UK

    Vishal Sharma

  15. Cardiology, University Hospital Birmingham and University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK

    Richard P. Steeds

Authors
  1. Thomas Mathew
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  2. Lynne Williams
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  3. Govardhan Navaratnam
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  4. Bushra Rana
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  5. Richard Wheeler
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  6. Katherine Collins
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  7. Allan Harkness
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  8. Richard Jones
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  9. Dan Knight
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  10. Kevin O’Gallagher
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  11. David Oxborough
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  12. Liam Ring
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  13. Julie Sandoval
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  14. Martin Stout
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  15. Vishal Sharma
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  16. Richard P. Steeds
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Consortia

British Society of Echocardiography Education Committee

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Vishal Sharma.

Additional information

(T Mathew is the Lead Author)

(L Williams and G Navaratnam contributed equally)

(B Rana is the Education Committee Chair)

(R Wheeler is the Lead for Protocols)

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Open Access This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (https://doi.org/creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.

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Mathew, T., Williams, L., Navaratnam, G. et al. Diagnosis and assessment of dilated cardiomyopathy: a guideline protocol from the British Society of Echocardiography. Echo Res Pract 4, G1–G13 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1530/ERP-16-0037

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1530/ERP-16-0037

Keywords

Echo Research & Practice

ISSN: 2055-0464

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