Correlative Study of Ecg and Echocardiographic Findings in Copd Patients

Abstract

OBJECTIVESChronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is one of the commonest causes of mortality and morbidity in our country. The habit of smoking, increasing air pollution and other environmental factors facilitate the occurrence of this condition. COPD causes pulmonary hypertension through several inter-related mechanisms including hypoventilation, hypoxemia from ventilation perfusion mismatch and destruction of perfused surface area. The altered haematological and hemo-rheological factors also contribute to the development of pulmonary hypertension in COPD. Our study aims at correlating ECG and Echocardiographic findings with the severity of COPD. METHODSOur study was conducted at a tertiary hospital in Bangalore. We studied 61 patients, among them 21 were mild COPD, 20 were moderate COPD and 20 patients belonged to severe COPD patients. Patients with COPD as defined by ATS (American Thoracic Society) were studied. The lung function parameters were assessed by Spiroanalyser (Vitalograph). They were categorised into mild, moderate and severe COPD based on the percentage of predicted FEV1. All of them underwent detailed clinical examination, ECG, Echocardiography and routine investigations. RESULTSThe mean age of all patients was 61.11±10.51 years and majority 85.25% were males. The most common ECG finding observed in all the groups was 'P' pulmonale [28.57%, 40%, 45% in mild, moderate and severe COPD respectively]. The mean RV area, RA area, RVAWT were 14.26±4.82cm 2 , 7.98±1.97cm 2 and 0.61±0.18cms; 19.19±6.02cm 2 , 10.68±3.45cm 2 and 0.83±0.17cms; and 23.43±5.83cm 2 , 13.58±3.18cm 2 and 0.91±0.18cms in mild, moderate and severe COPD patients respectively.