Myocardial function in hypothyroidism. Relation to disease severity and response to treatment

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
Systolic time intervals (STI) were used to evaluate myocardial function prospectively in 29 hypothyroid patients. The patients were divided into 3 categories of disease severity: (1) severe hypothyroidism, (2) mild hypothyroidism, and (3) decreased thyroid reserve or prehypothyroidism. Groups 1 and 2 showed decreased myocardial contractility with a prolonged preejection period (PEP), shortened left ventricular ejection time (LVET), and increase PEP/LVET, compared with normal controls. The STI were more abnormal (P < .05) in group 1 than in group 2, suggesting that the severity of myocardial dysfunction correlates with the severity of the hypothyroidism. Group 3 had normal STI. Ten patients were restudied when euthyroid and showed complete normalization of their STI, supporting the thesis that hypothyroidism was the sole cause of the initial myocardial dysfunction.