Transthoracic second harmonic two- and three-dimensional echocardiography for detection of patent foramen ovale

Abstract

In this cohort of patients, TEE confirms the role of 'gold standard' exam for the detection of PFO; the non-invasive methods, and the TTE in particular, present a good diagnostic accuracy, but are inferior to the TEE because of the low negative predictive value and the non-optimal detection of small shunts. If the only purpose of TEE is the detection of significative interatrial shunt, TEE can be replaced by TTE. The R3DTE presents a good diagnostic accuracy, provides a better anatomical definition of the interatrial septum, and may have a role in this setting of patients, but does not add a lot to the TTE for the diagnosis.

A comparison of contrast transthoracic echocardiography and contrast transcranial Doppler in cryptogenic stroke patients with patent foramen ovale

“…From our results, cTCD and cTTE have similar sensitivities and could be used to filter preliminarily PFO cases. Maffè et al had reported that cTTE and cTCD had comparable sensitivity compared with TEE, with TEE as the reference standard, 89% for TTE, and 85% for TCD (Kühl et al, ; Maffè et al, ; Souteyrand et al, ). These are consistent with the results of our present study (González‐Alujas et al, ; Jong‐Won et al, ; Zhao et al, ).…”

Patent Foramen Ovale Closure Using a Bioabsorbable Closure Device

“…However, TEE is semi-invasive, timeconsuming, and the performance of an adequate Valsalva maneuver is invariably impaired. Furthermore, contrast TTE with second harmonic imaging, as used in our study, seems to be a very good alternative for TEE as a first-line exam (26).…”

Determination of the Optimum Number of Cardiac Cycles to Differentiate Intra‐Pulmonary Shunt and Patent Foramen Ovale by Saline Contrast Two‐ and Three‐Dimensional Echocardiography

“…However, they only had 7 patients with pulmonary arterio‐venous malformations by TEE unlike a much larger population with IPS in our study. Maffe et al . have also reported high sensitivities of both saline contrast 2DTTE and 3DTTE for detection of PFO.…”