Prognostic value of left ventricular dyssynchrony by myocardial perfusion-gated SPECT in patients with normal and abnormal left ventricular functions

• DOI: 10.1007/s12350-014-9852-1
• Publication Date: 2014-03-12T15:34:25Z
• Authors: Nili Zafrir; Roman Nevzorov; Tamir Bental; Boris Strasberg; Ariel Gutstein; Israel Mats; Ran Kornowski; Alejandro Solodky
• Keywords: Heart Failure; Male; Incidence; Myocardial Perfusion Imaging; Reproducibility of Results; Arrhythmias, Cardiac; Comorbidity; Prognosis; Risk Assessment; Sensitivity and Specificity; 3. Good health; Causality; Survival Rate; Ventricular Dysfunction, Left; 03 medical and health sciences; Death, Sudden, Cardiac; 0302 clinical medicine; Reference Values; Humans; Female; Israel; Cardiac-Gated Single-Photon Emission Computer-Assisted Tomography; Aged

Left ventricular (LV) dyssynchrony by phase analysis has been studied by myocardial perfusion imaging (MPI)-gated SPECT in patients with LV dysfunction in various clinical settings. We aimed to investigate the routine use of phase analysis with gated SPECT for predicting cardiac outcome.Patients referred to a tertiary medical center in 2010-2011 prospectively underwent a gated SPECT and phase analysis, and follow-up for cardiac events. The values of clinical variables, MPI, LV function, and LV dyssynchrony in predicting cardiac events were tested by univariate and multivariate analyses.The study group included 787 patients (66.5 ± 11 years, 81% men) followed for a mean duration of 18.3 ± 6.2 months. There were 45 (6%) cardiac events defined as composite endpoint; cardiac death occurred in 26 patients, and the rest had new-onset or worsening heart failure and life-threatening arrhythmias. In multivariate analysis, it was shown that NYHA class, diabetes mellitus, and LVEF <50% were the independent predictors for composite endpoint. However, the independent predictors for cardiac mortality were NYHA class (for each increment in class) and phase standard deviation (SD) (for each 10° increment).Gated SPECT with phase analysis for the assessment of LV dyssynchrony can successfully predict cardiac death together with NYHA class, in patients with LV dysfunction.