Figure 11
LV myocardial strain in diastolic heart failure. The left and right images show (longitudinal) myocardial strains overlaid on four-chamber tagged images at end-systole for diastolic heart failure and normal subjects, respectively. LV is manually traced for clarity. Solid and dashed arrows point to LV free wall and septum, respectively. The curves show longitudinal strain values through the cardiac cycle for patients (solid) and normals (dashed). Diastolic heart failure is characterized by a small strain dynamic range (difference between end-systolic and end-diastolic strains) and less relaxation during diastole, compared to normal.