European heart journal
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European heart journal · Aug 2003
Multicenter StudyHigh prevalence of right ventricular involvement in endurance athletes with ventricular arrhythmias. Role of an electrophysiologic study in risk stratification.
Electrocardiographic abnormalities and premature ventricular contractions are common in athletes and are generally benign. However, the specific outcome of high-level endurance athletes with frequent and complex ventricular arrhythmias is unclear. Also, information on the predictive accuracy of different investigations in this subgroup is unknown. ⋯ Complex ventricular arrhythmias do not necessarily represent a benign finding in endurance athletes. An electrophysiological study is indicated for risk evaluation, both by defining inducibility and identifying the arrhythmogenic mechanism. Endurance athletes with arrhythmias have a high prevalence of right ventricular structural and/or arrhythmic involvement. Endurance sports seems to be related to the development and/or progression of the underlying arrhythmogenic substrate.
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European heart journal · Aug 2003
In-hospital and long-term outcome after sub-massive and massive pulmonary embolism submitted to thrombolytic therapy.
From a registry of 249 confirmed pulmonary embolism (PE) patients submitted to thrombolytic therapy (TT), we analysed predictors of in-hospital course and long-term mortality. ⋯ The recovery of RV function should be considered as a marker of thrombolysis efficacy, while residual pulmonary vascular obstruction and cancer are independent predictors of long-term mortality. These results advocate the identification of high-risk patients by means of systematic lung-scan and echocardiography pre- and post-thrombolysis, and raise the question of the need for thromboendarterectomy in patients with residual pulmonary vascular obstruction.