Clinical value of exercise Doppler echocardiography in patients with cardiac-valvular disease

Besides its usefulness for the detection of exercise-induced ischemia, conventional exercise testing may help to predict the onset of clinical events and the need for surgery in asymptomatic patients with cardiac-valvular disease. Doppler echocardiography examination during exercise recently emerged as a new stress testing modality that may add useful information regarding dynamism of LV function, valve disease severity and pulmonary circulation. Few studies have demonstrated a correlation between the results of exercise Doppler echocardiography and clinical outcome. Preliminary experience needs to be confirmed to warrant routine use of Doppler echocardiography examination during exercise in the evaluation of patients with cardiac-valve disease. (C) 2008 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.