Estimation of pulmonary artery pressure by colour guided continuous wave Doppler in cases of ventricular septal defect and tricuspid regurgitation.

The accuracy of a non-invasive estimation of systolic pulmonary artery pressure in 33 patients with ventricular septal defect and/or tricuspid regurgitation, by colour guided continuous wave Doppler was evaluated. The estimated pulmonary artery pressure correlated well with values obtained at cardiac catheterization (r = 0.93). Correlation was better in cases with ventricular septal defect (r = 0.98) than in cases with tricuspid regurgitation (r = 0.87). Pulmonary artery pressure was under-estimated in cases with mild tricuspid regurgitation, probably due to eccentricity of regurgitant jet in some of these cases.