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CLINICAL STUDY

The usefulness of a 10% air-10% blood-80% saline mixture for contrast echocardiography: Doppler measurement of pulmonary artery systolic pressure

^* Division of Cardiology, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California, USA

Manuscript received May 15, 2001; revised manuscript received August 29, 2001, accepted September 7, 2001.

^* Reprint requests and correspondence: Dr. Robert J. Siegel, Cardiac Noninvasive Laboratory, Room # 5335, Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, Los Angeles, California 90048, USA.
siegel{at}cshs.org

OBJECTIVES: We assessed an air-blood-saline mixture for Doppler measurement of pulmonary artery systolic pressure (PASP) and the mechanism of enhancement of the Doppler signal by this mixture.

BACKGROUND: Underestimation of PASP by Doppler echocardiography occurs with inadequate continuous wave (CW) signals of tricuspid regurgitation (TR).

METHODS: We assessed in vitro the diameter and concentration of microbubbles of agitated air-saline mixture, air-blood-saline mixture and 10% air-10% plasma-80% saline mixture immediately, 5, 10 and 20 s after agitation. In 20 patients, PASP was estimated by Swan-Ganz catheter and CW Doppler of TR: 1) without contrast injection; 2) with intravenous injection of 10% air-90% saline; and 3) 10% blood-10% air-80% saline mixture.

RESULTS: Compared to air-saline, addition of blood or plasma to the air-saline solution significantly increased the concentration of microbubbles (p < 0.001). The air-blood-saline (26.7 ± 7.2 µ) and air-plasma-saline mixture (25.3 ± 7.4 µ) had smaller microbubbles than air-saline mixture (31.6 ± 8.2 µ) (p < 0.001). The correlation between Doppler- and catheter-measured PASP at baseline (r = 0.64) improved with agitated air-saline (r = 0.86). With the air-blood-saline mixture, the correlation further improved (r = 0.92) and the best limits of agreement were obtained.

CONCLUSIONS: The combination of the patient’s own blood is a method of making a sterile solution of numerous small microbubbles for injection into the right-sided cardiac chambers. Clinically, the air-blood-saline mixture is easily prepared at bedside and is superior to the air-saline mixture in assessing PASP in patients with inadequate CW Doppler signals.

Abbreviations and Acronyms   CI   confidence interval   CW   continuous wave   PASP   pulmonary artery systolic pressure   TR   tricuspid regurgitation

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