ABSTRACT
Objective To assess the left ventricular contraction asynchrony in patients with acute myocardial infarction(AMI) by velocity vector imaging(VVI).Methods Sixty AMI patients and 40 healthy volunteers were included.Using VVI,the time to peak longitudinal systolic velocity (TL-V) was measured in the left ventricular long axis views,the time to peak radial systolic velocity (TR-V) was measured in parasternal short axis views.The deviation of the earliest and the latest TL-V and TR-V (Ts max-min) was measured,and the standard deviation of TL-V and TR-V (TS-SD) was also measured.Results ①TL-V ,TR-V of the infarcted and non-infarcted segments in patients with acute myocardial infarction were longer than those of the normal segments (P ＜0.05).②The longitudinal Tsmax-min,Ts-SD and the radial Tsmax-min,Ts-SD in infarcted patients were increased compared with the healthy volunteers (P ＜0.001).③Ts of the infarcted segments was increased in turn from the class Ⅰ to class Ⅳ of the cardiac function (P ＜0.001).Conclusions VVI could be used to assess the left ventricular contraction asynchrony in patients with AMI.VVI is a new useful method to determine the infarcted segments.