Evaluation of new single, oblique chest lead for the rapid screening of electrocardiographic abnormalities in large populations

Abstract

Single, oblique chest-lead electrocardiograms from 996 subjects have been compared with standard electrocardiograms in order to test the efficiency of the single lead as a screening technique. Tracings were obtained from hospital patients, small selected groups of subjects, and a large institutional population. The oblique chest lead was effective in demonstrating myocardial infarction, left ventricular hypertrophy, arrhythmias, atrioventricular and bundle branch block, atrial hypertrophy, and primary T-wave changes. Its over-all specificity was 87 per cent, with a sensitivity of 83 per cent in the initial studies. With further experience, sensitivity and specificity rates of about 90 per cent were obtained. The use of the single, oblique chest-lead electrocardiogram is an effective, practical, and rapid screening procedure applicable to the study of mass population. With this technique, 30 to 50 subjects can be screened hourly.