Q. What is Echocardiography?

Ans.

Echocardiography has become an established and powerful tool for diagnosing presence of CAD and defining its consequence. It can help in early detection of acute myocardial infarction (even in the absence of typical electrocardiographic evidence), evaluation of RWMA, detection of post-infarction mechanical and functional complications. Stress echocardiography is useful for evaluating the presence, location and severity of inducible myocardial ischemia, as well as for risk stratification and prognostication.

When a patient presents to the emergency room with chest pain, early diagnosis is warranted to provide appropriate therapy to the patient. Most important is to know whether pain is ischemic or non-ischemic. Here lies the role of echocardiography, besides the use to cardiac enzymes to diagnose acute coronary syndrome. Echocardiography provides the greatest amount of incremental information when the clinical history and ECG findings are non-diagnostic.