Aims: Although left ventricular (LV) relaxation is well recognized as a predictor of mitral annulus (MA) early diastolic (E') velocity, its significance relative to other predictors of E' is less well understood.
Methods and results: We assessed 40 healthy volunteers, 43 patients with acutely decompensated chronic systolic heart failure (HF), and 36 patients with hypertrophic obstructive cardiomyopathy (HOCM) using echocardiography and right or left heart catheterization. Data were obtained at baseline. In addition, in healthy volunteers haemodynamics were varied by graded saline infusion and low body negative pressure, while in HF patients it was varied by vasoactive drug treatment. E- and A-wave velocity (E/A) ratio of the mitral valve inflow, systolic MA velocity integral (s' integral) and E' and late velocity (A') of lateral and septal MA pulsed wave velocities were assessed by echocardiography. Time constant of isovolumic pressure decay τ(0)) was calculated from isovolumic relaxation time/[ln(aortic dicrotic notch pressure) - ln(LV filling pressure)]. In all three groups, s' integral was the strongest predictor of E' (partial r= 0.53-0.79; 0.81 for three groups combined), followed by E/A ratio (partial r= 0.10-0.78; 0.26 for all groups combined) and τ(0) (partial r= -0.1 to 0.023; -0.21 for all groups combined).
Conclusion: In healthy adults, patients with systolic HF, or patients with HOCM, E' is related to LV long-axis function and E/A ratio, a global marker of LV filling. E' appears less sensitive to LV relaxation.