Echocardiography in pulmonary hypertension and normal population v1.1

  • Research type

    Research Study

  • Full title

    Assessment of the right ventricle by advanced echocardiography at rest, exercise and chemical stress, in normal adults and adults with pulmonary hypertension.

  • IRAS ID

    194952

  • Contact name

    Timothy M Crowe

  • Contact email

    tim.crowe@nhs.net

  • Sponsor organisation

    Golden Jubilee Research Institute

  • Duration of Study in the UK

    1 years, 9 months, 0 days

  • Research summary

    Assessment of the right ventricle by advanced echocardiography at rest, exercise and chemical stress, in normal adults and adults with pulmonary hypertension.

    This study will assess the usefulness of advanced techniques in Echocardiography in assessing the function and size of the heart of people with and without pulmonary hypertension (high pressure in the blood vessels supplying the lungs). The advanced techniques include strain analysis by speckle tracking, three dimensional image acquisition, exercise echocardiography and stress echocardiography.
    Strain is a measure of the deformation (change in shape) of the heart wall during contraction or relaxation. Speckle tracking is the use of specifically designed computer software to measure strain of the heart wall. Three dimensional imaging enables a view of the entire ventricle and allows more measurements of the heart to be made. Exercise and chemical stress (administration of a drug causing increase in heart rate and strength of contraction) echocardiography are different methods to increase the heart's workload while acquiring images of the heart.

    Resting right heart strain has already been shown to have prognostic value in pulmonary hypertension. No studies have specifically looked at comparing exercise and chemical stress echocardiography with strain and three dimensional analyses in the described population groups. This study sets out to identify the data that can be obtained and provide direction for future areas.

    The study is eligible to healthy controls and population groups with Pulmonary Arterial Hypertension (excluding congenital heart disease) or Chronic Thromboembolic Pulmonary Hypertension, who can perform exercise and have no contra-indication to Dobutamine administration. The participants will receive two echocardiograms on separate visits. Each visit will include a six minute walk and two blood tests. Total duration of each visit is 2 hours. The study will take place at the Golden Jubilee National Hospital in Glasgow.

  • REC name

    South East Scotland REC 02

  • REC reference

    16/SS/0183

  • Date of REC Opinion

    27 Jan 2017

  • REC opinion

    Further Information Favourable Opinion