The Maximal Oxygen Intake Test in Patients with Predominant Mitral Stenosis

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Abstract
Maximal oxygen intake and dye dilution studies were done on 15 men with mitral stenosis; in 7 of them the studies were repeated after mitral valvulotomy. The maximal oxygen intake test can be used as an objective means of evaluating the degree of dynamic impairment in many patients with mitral stenosis. The response of patients with mitral stenosis to exercise differs from that of the normal subject in that ability to increase stroke volume is limited; widening of arteriovenous oxygen difference is more marked and oxygen tension of blood returning from active muscle is lower; and "central" blood volume is increased relatively more, at any given level of cardiac output, as exercise loads rise. Mitral valvulotomy in patients with mitral stenosis causes a definite change toward normal of the dynamic response to exercise.