A clinical study on velocity patterns of pulmonary venous flow in canine heartworm disease

In this study, we evaluated methods of determining the velocity patterns of pulmonary venous flow (PVF) in dogs and then investigated the relationship of the patterns to cardiac functions in heartworm disease (HD) by transthoracic echocardiography (TTE). The results revealed that there was a good correlation between PVF patterns determined by transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) and TTE in animals lying on their left sides. The measurement of S and D wave velocities (PVS and PVD) by TTE was shown to allow clinical determination of the velocity patterns of PVF in dogs. The HD groups showed significant increases in PVS and PVD, and S and D wave time-velocity integrals (S-TVI and D-TVI) of the right cranial lobe PVF, when compared with the normal group, as determined by TTE (P