Use Of Color Doppler Research Articles

The use of colour Doppler in fetal echocardiography

Doppler colour flow mapping provides a non-invasive method for studying patterns of blood flow in the cardiovascular system. We undertook a prospective study using this technique in order to document normal and abnormal patterns in the human fetus. A group of 50 consecutive normal fetuses were examined with colour flow mapping. Patterns of flow that could be readily identified in the majority included inflow at the atrioventricular valves, outflow through the arterial valves and flow in the aortic arch and arterial duct. Flow across the oval foramen and in the pulmonary veins was identified in approximately half the patients. Colour Doppler also proved helpful in the detection and definition of cardiac anomalies. A series of 74 cardiac malformations, seen during 1988, were examined with colour flow mapping. The presence or absence of flow across valves could be confirmed, valvar incompetence demonstrated and the direction of blood flow displayed across both normal and abnormal communications. Colour Doppler studies in the human fetus can thus improve the understanding of the characteristics of flow of blood and add to the accuracy of antenatal diagnosis of congenital heart disease.

Pulmonary artery sling: definitive diagnosis by colour Doppler flow mapping avoiding cardiac catheterisation.

Pulmonary artery sling is a rare abnormality that usually presents in infancy with wheeze or stridor. Diagnoses by cross sectional echocardiography, computed tomography, and magnetic resonance imaging have been described but pulmonary arteriography was regarded as essential for a definite diagnosis. The use of colour Doppler adds to the diagnostic certainty of cross sectional echocardiography and colour Doppler provided a definite diagnosis in an infant that allowed surgical repair without the need for cardiac catheterisation. Postoperative flow through the left pulmonary artery was also assessed by Doppler, and this avoided the need for repeat catheterisation or perfusion lung scanning.

Color doppler recognition of left ventricular pseudoaneurysm

L eft ventricular pseudoaneurysm occurs rarely following myocardial infarction, cardiac surgery, trauma, or endocarditis when myocardial perforation produces a locally contained chamber [1,2]. High mortality results from cardiac failure and the propensity of pseudoaneurysms to rupture. Surgical repair is effective; thus, early recognition is of paramount importance [3,4]. We describe the use of color Doppler (twodimensional Doppler color flow mapping) in diagnosing left ventricular pseudoaneurysm.