Journals of Gerontology Series A: Biological Sciences and Medical Sciences, Vol 53, Issue 1 B25-B31, Copyright © 1998 by The Gerontological Society of America
Age variance of left ventricular diameters in dogs with cardiac disease
PL Kerkhof, A Roos, G ter Haar, S Kocsis, HL Pijnenburg and AA Stokhof
Department of Veterinary Basic Sciences, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.
Ventricular size increases during growth, but often due to cardiac disease.
This study aims to describe left ventricular dimension interrelations using
a representation that is applicable to patients with cardiac disease, and
subsequently to statistically study possible age and gender influences in a
large population. In retrospect we analyzed echocardiographically obtained
diameters of the left ventricle in 442 dogs of various breeds with
congenital or acquired heart disease. Also, we compared our findings with
published data on humans and other animals. Multivariate regression
analysis was applied to assess possible influences of age and gender. A
high correlation was found for end-systolic diameter (ESD) versus
end-diastolic diameter (EDD): ESD (cm) = -1.01 cm + 0.93 x EDD (cm) with r
= 0.94, p < .00001. Next, these patients were categorized into three age
groups (divisions at 3 and 7 years). We detected a slight age dependent
effect: the regression coefficients for the younger group differed from the
two older groups. No significant gender-related influence was detected. The
observation of a high correlation for the ESD versus EDD relationship could
be confirmed by reanalysis of published data on normal individuals and
human patients. The newly described relationship between ESD and EDD
applies in particular to cardiac patients. This is a relevant finding,
because clinically important indices of ventricular performance generally
depend on ESD, EDD or both. Thus, ESD versus EDD offers a convenient
framework for studies on cardiac volume regulation and performance in the
cardiopathological spectrum, while permitting incorporation of modulating
effects related to age.
