Congestive heart failure: Dx and Rx in the elderly.

Ventricular gallop is a reliable indicator of poor ventricular compliance and heart failure in the elderly. Late diastolic atrial gallop, however, has very little use in the diagnosis of heart disease in the elderly. M-mode and 2-dimensional echocardiography are the most expeditious and least costly of the non-invasive means of identifying the cause of heart failure in the elderly. They enable rapid assessment of cardiac chamber size, wall thickness and contractility, valve morphology and motion, and easy evaluation of the pericardium.