[Assessment of ventriculoarterial coupling in humans by transesophageal echocardiography and radial artery pressure tracing].

To investigate coupling between the heart and arterial system in patients undergoing elective non-cardiac surgery, we determined both the ventricular elastance and the effective arterial elastance in two groups of subjects: normal group, 68 subjects without heart disease; and cardiac group, 33 subjects with heart disease. Left ventricular end-systolic (Ves) and end-diastolic (Ved) volumes were determined by transesophageal echocardiography. By assuming that left ventricular end-systolic pressure (Pes) is close to mean arterial blood pressure (MAP) and that x-axis intercept (Vo) is zero, the ventricular elastance (E'max) was approximated as MAP/Ves, and the effective arterial elastance (Ea) as MAP/(Ved-Ves). In 222 (74%) of the 299 measurements obtained in normal group, Ea/E'max was nearly 0.5, which is a condition for a maximal mechanical efficiency, while in 61 measurements (20%) Ea was almost equal to E'max (Ea/E'max = 1), which is a condition for maximal stroke work from a given end-diastolic volume. In contrast, in cardiac group, Ea/E'max was nearly 0.5 in 56 (41%) of the 137 measurements, while in 42 measurements (31%) Ea/E'max was nearly 1. In addition, although the value of Ea/E'max over 2, which represents severe heart failure, was not observed in normal group, Ea/E'max was over 2 in 10 measurements (7%) in cardiac group. Thus, the present results suggest that, as reported previously in awake patients, ventriculoarterial coupling is set toward higher left ventricular work efficiency in surgical patients without heart disease, whereas in patients with heart disease, ventricular and arterial properties are so matched as to maximize stroke work at the expense of the work efficiency.