[Diagnosis of cardiac causes of cerebral embolism: a contribution to 2D echocardiography and long-term ECG].

Certain cardiac diseases are regarded as potential sources of embolic strokes. Due to the high risk of recurrent brain embolism diagnosis of a potential cardiac source implies therapeutic consequences in most cases. The contribution of 2D-echocardiography and of ECG Holter monitoring to the detection of possible cardiac sources of cerebral embolism is not yet fully established. We therefore performed 2D-echocardiography and 24-h Holter monitoring in 135 consecutive patients with regional cerebral ischemia. In 17 (12.6%) out of the 135 patients a potential cardiac source of cerebral embolism was found, four of them presented with two cardiac disorders compatible with a cardiac source of embolism. In 10 patients a cardiac disease as potential source of cerebral embolism was already detected during routine examination. 2D-echocardiography disclosed no cardiac embolic source, which was not suspected before but confirmed the diagnosis in five cases. Holter monitoring identified 16 cases with arrhythmias, which may cause systemic embolism. Among these cases seven were not detected during the routine examinations, all of them suffered from intermittent atrial fibrillation. It is concluded that Holter monitoring contributes more than 2D-echocardiography to disclose hitherto unsuspected potential cardiogenic sources of brain embolism.