Echocardiography for Volume Assessment in Acute Myocardial Infarction

Background Errors caused by improper volume estimation increase acute mortality rates in acute myocardial infarction (AMI). We aimed to determine volume status in AMI patients using echocardiography and to correlate the findings with clinical outcomes. Methods This cross-sectional, single-center study was performed at a tertiary care center in India between August 2017 and September 2020 involving AMI patients. We performed echocardiography for all patients. Parameters such as left ventricle (LV) and atrium size, LV end-diastolic pressure, inferior vena cava (IVC) size and size variation, velocity stroke volume, and velocity time integral variation were measured. B-lines were recorded by scanning 32 regions on the anterior chest in the supine position using cardiac probes of echocardiography. Results A total of 184 patients were enrolled in the study with male predominance (82.1%). The mean age of patients was 58.2 ± 10.7 years. Dilated (>2.1 cm) and collapsible (<50%) IVC, and B-lines were significantly associated with heart failure (HF) (p<0.001; r=0.87 and p<0.001; r=0.74, respectively). The area under receiver operating characteristics (AUROC) curve to diagnose HF at a cut-off value of >10 for B-lines was 0.897 (0.842-0.951). AUROC curve for IVC size in diagnosing hypovolemia was 0.063 (0.000-0.130). Conclusions Volume status based on IVC size and B-lines detected by echocardiography has a strong prognostic value in AMI patients and should be included in the routine assessment of these patients.