The Role of Percutaneous Balloon Pericardial Window Formation for Malignant Pericardial Effusion

BACKGROUND: There are several ways to treat for recurrent pericardial effussion and cardiac tamponade due to malignancy. They are repeated pericardiocentesis, pericardial instillation of sclerosing and chemotherapeutic agents, surgical creation of a pericardial window and transthoracic pericardiectomy. Surgical techniques are usually effective but bear a significant morbidity and mortality especially in chronic debilitating cancer patients. So percutaneous balloon pericardial window as an alternative to surgery in these patients. METHODS: After pericardiocentesis was performed, a 0.035 inch J-tip guidewire was advanced into the pericardial space. And a pigtail catheter was advanced over the wire. A moderate amount of pericardial fluid were removed. A nd then the pigtail catheter was withdrawn and 8F sheath was inserted. A20mm diameter, 4cm long(Single balloon method) or two 10mm diameter, 4cm long balloon dilating catheter(Double balloon medium) was advanced over the wire to straddle the parietal pericardial border though the sheath. Several inflations of the balloon with a solution containing 50% radiographic contrast medium were performed until disappearance of the balloon waist. After balloon dilation, contrast medium from the pericardial space to subcutaneous tisse suggesting successful PBPWF. Single ballon method was employed in 4 patients and Dould balloon method in 2 patients. RESULT: We performed percutaneous balloon pericardial window formation in 6 patiemts with malignant pericardial effusion. We did percutaneous balloon pericardial window formation successfully in 5 patients and failed due to adhesion of parietal pericardium in 1 patient. One patient developed recurrent pericardial effusion with tamponade at a mean follow-up of 11.49.6 months(1.5-26 months). Conclusion: These results suggest that PBPWF is an alternative method less invasive than subxiphoid surgical windowing, espesially in critically ill patients with recurrent malignant pericardial effussion. It carries less risks and has more constant effect than repeated pericardiocentesis.

Clinical and Coronary Angiographic Findings of Patients with Angina Pectoris Showing Persistent T Wave Inversion in the Precordial Leads on the Resting Electrocardiogram and T Wave Changes after Treatments

The resting electrocardiography performed routinely in the clinical field is a useful method for the diagnosis of ischemic heart diasese and for predicting its prognosis. There have been reports about angina patients with symmetric T wave inversion in the precordial leads on the resting electrocardiogram(EGC) who usually showed stenotic lesions of left anterior descending coronary artery and with poor prognosis. However, we have had no studies on this subject in Korea. The authors conducted retrospectively a comparative study on the patients with angina pectoris in the Yonsei University Severance hospital from jan. 1980 to Dec. 1989. We set two groups for comparison; one group consisted of 89 patients who had more than 50% stenosis in luminal diameter of coronary artery on coronary angiogram and persistent symmetric T wave inversion in the precordial leads(T negaive group) ; the other group in cluded 132 patients who had normal ECG but significant stenosis of the coronary arteries(T positive group). We compared these two groups in clinical and coronary angiographic findings and evaluated the changes of T wave after percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA) and medical treatment in the T negative group. 1) The mean age of the T nagative group was 56.4+/-12.9 years, and the male to female ratio was 2.3 : 1. In the T positive group, the mean age was 54.4+/-8.8 years, and the male to female ratio was 3.1 : 1. There was a relatively high occurrence rate in females in the T negative group, but this was not statistically significant. The duration of angina was 5.7+/-11.2 months in the T negative group, and 9.0+/-13.8 months in the T positive group, and relatively short in the T negative group. There was no difference in the risk factors between these two groups except for a slightly higher level of serum cholesterol in the T positive group than the T negative group(187.4+/-33.5mg/dl v/s/ 199.9+/-49.2mg/dl, p<0.05). 2) The extent of coronary artery disease in the T negative group was 3 cases of left main coronary artery disease(3.3%), 54 cases of one vessel disease(60.7%), 20 cases of two vessel disease(22.5%), 12 cases of three vessel disease(13.5%); in the T positive group, left main coronary artery disease was found in 10 cases(7.5%), on e vessel disease in 71 cases(53.8%), two vessel disease in 29 cases(22.0%), three vessel disease in 22 cases(16.7%). There was no difference in the extent of coronary artery disease between these two groups. 3) The occurrence rate of involvement of left anterior descending artery(LAD) and its branches was 87.9% in the T negative group, and 76.5% in the T positive group, which indicated more frequent involvement of LAD in the T negative group(p<0.05). The mean degree of stenosis of LAD was 79.5+/-17.0% in the T negative group, and 77.0+/-16.2% in the T positive group, but there was no significant difference between the two groups. Those patients with more than 95% stenosis of LAD were 32.9% of the T negative group, 14.3% of the T positve grouup, and the T negative group showed a significantly higher rate than the T positive group(p<0.05). 4) The wall motion abnormalities in the LAD territory were more frequently noted in the T negative group than the T positive group(25.3% v.s. 11.9%, p<0.05). However, upon determining the ejection fraction(68.8+/-12.8% v.s. 71.9+/-11.4%) and left ventricular end diastolic pressure(11.6+/-5.4mmHg v.s. 12.9+/-4.9mmHg), no difference was found. 5) There were no episodes of acute myocardial infarction or hospital death during the admission in either group except for 2 cases of death after coronary artery bypass graft in the T positive group. 6) Although the patients who unerwent PTCA showed more severe stenosis of LAD than those who had medical treatment only in the T negative group(863.8+/-10.9% v.s. 70.8+/-21.4%, p<0.05), there was a higher rate of normalization of T wave inversion in the PTCA group compared with that in the medical treatment gorup(70.8% v.s. 37.0%, p<0.05). The above results suggest that T wave inversion in the precordial leads on the resting ECG in patients with angina pectoris was associated with severe stenosis of LAD and ventricular wall motion abnormalities, and the T wave inversion could be normalized with improvement of myocardial ischemia and the prognosis for such patients was relatively good in appropriate treatments such as PTCA were performed.

Segmental Analysis of Thallium-201 Stress Myocardial Perfusion Scanning in Coronary Artery Disease

This study was done to determine the value of thallium-201 stress myocardial perfusion scanning for identifying disease in the individual coronary arteries. Segement analysis of rest and stress myocardial perfusion scanning was performed in 65 subjects who underwent coronary arteriography. Anterolateral wall detects had a sensitivity of 70%, a spectivity of 92%, and a predicitive accuracy of 93.3% for identifying left anterior descending(LAD) coronary artery disease(CAD). Anteroseptal wall defects had a sensitivy of 62.5%, a specificity of 80%, and a predictive accuracy of 83.3% for identifying LAD CAD. Septal wall defects had a sensitivity of 67.5%, a specificity of 92%, and a predictive accuracy of 94.4% for identifying LAD CAD. Inferior wall defects had a sensitivity of 65.4%, a specificity of 89.7%, and a predictive accuracy of 80.9% for identifying right CAD. Posterolateral wall defects had a identifying left circumflex CAD. Thus, although senmental analysis of stress myocardial perfusin scanning can identify LAD CAD with high sensitivity and specificity, only moderate sensitivity and specificity are achieved in identifying right CAD or left circumflex CAD. But stress myocardial perfusion scanning has tendency to identify the most severely ischemic area, use of segmental analysis may be of benefit in the evaluation of patients with ischemic heart disease before or after coronary artery bypass graft and percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty.