Two-dimensional Doppler color flow mapping for detecting atrial and ventricular septal defects. Studies in an animal model and in the clinical setting.

In experimental studies in six dogs as well as in clinical studies in eleven patients with atrial septal defect and 27 patients with ventricular septal defect, the diagnostic usefulness of color Doppler echocardiography in detection of small septal defects and multiple defects was analyzed. The study showed that atrial or ventricular septal defects with a size of 2.5 to 3 mm or more, which eluded detection with two-dimensional echocardiography, were easily identified with the color Doppler method. Additionally, multiple defects were reliably demonstrated. In atrial septal defects, according to the results of this study, the shunt area in the color Doppler image enables a semiquantitative estimation of the shunt volume.