Short-term repeatability of the peguero-lo presti electrocardiographic left ventricular hypertrophy criteria.

BACKGROUND: Electrocardiographic left ventricular hypertrophy (ECG-LVH) represents preclinical cardiovascular disease and predicts cardiovascular disease morbidity and mortality. While the newly developed Peguero-Lo Presti ECG-LVH criteria have greater sensitivity for LVH than the Cornell voltage and Sokolow-Lyon criteria, its short-term repeatability is unknown. Therefore, we characterized the short-term repeatability of Peguero-Lo Presti ECG-LVH criteria and evaluate its agreement with Cornell voltage and Sokolow-Lyon ECG-LVH criteria. METHODS: Participants underwent two resting, standard, 12-lead ECGs at each of two visits one week apart (n = 63). We defined a Peguero-Lo Presti index as a sum of the deepest S wave amplitude in any single lead and lead V4 (i.e., SD  + SV4 ) and defined Peguero-Lo Presti LVH index as ≥ 2,300 µV among women and ≥ 2,800 µV among men. We estimated repeatability as an intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC), agreement as a prevalence-adjusted bias-adjusted kappa coefficient (κ), and precision using 95% confidence intervals (CIs). RESULTS: The Peguero-Lo Presti index was repeatable: ICC (95% CI) = 0.94 (0.91-0.97). Within-visit agreement of Peguero-Lo Presti LVH was high at the first and second visits: κ (95% CI) = 0.97 (0.91-1.00) and 1.00 (1.00-1.00). Between-visit agreement of the first and second measurements at each visit was comparable: κ (95% CI) = 0.90 (0.80-1.00) and 0.93 (0.85-1.00). Agreement of Peguero-Lo Presti and Cornell or Sokolow-Lyon LVH on any one of the four ECGs was slightly lower: κ (95% CI) = 0.71 (0.54-0.89). CONCLUSION: The Peguero-Lo Presti index and LVH have excellent repeatability and agreement, which support their use in clinical and epidemiological studies.

Short-term repeatability of electrocardiographic criteria of left ventricular hypertrophy.

BACKGROUND: Left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) is a marker of cardiac end-organ damage and a risk factor for cardiovascular morbidity and mortality. Although clinical trials and cohort studies commonly use the electrocardiogram (ECG) for LVH assessment, the repeatability of ECG-LVH criteria has not been sufficiently examined. Therefore, we evaluated the repeatability of ECG-LVH criteria. METHODS: Participants (n = 63) underwent two standard ECGs at each of two visits, two weeks apart. The ECGs were processed centrally to calculate Cornell voltage (CV) LVH, Cornell voltage product (CVP) LVH, Sokolow-Lyon (SL) LVH, and Sokolow-Lyon product (SLP) LVH. We also used the waveforms measurements contributing to these LVH criteria as continuous variables, referred to here as CV-index, CVP-index, and SL-index. We calculated the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC), minimal detectable change (95% confidence), and the prevalence-adjusted bias-adjusted kappa (PABAK). RESULTS: ICCs (95% confidence intervals (CI)) were 0.97 (0.96, 0.98) for CV-index, 0.97 (0.95, 0.98) for CVP-index, and 0.93 (0.90, 0.96) for log of SL-index. Minimal detectable change between repeat measures of CV-index, CVP-index, and log of SL-index were ≥236.7 mV, ≥26.7 mV, and ≥0.09 mV, respectively. The within-visit PABAK was 1 for all ECG-LVH criteria, except for the first visit SLP-LVH (PABAK = 0.93). Between-visit PABAK ranged from 0.83 to 0.97 across LVH criteria. CONCLUSIONS: CV, CVP, and SL ECG-LVH as continuous variables have excellent repeatability, and as binary variables have excellent within-visit agreement and good between-visit agreement. These results alleviate concerns about the repeatability the ECG-LVH use in clinical trials and epidemiologic studies.