AJP - Heart and Circulatory Physiology, Vol 250, Issue 1 131-H136, Copyright © 1986 by American Physiological Society
Biplane ventriculography in the rat
J. L. Heckman, L. Garvin, T. Brown, W. Stevenson-Smith, W. P. Santamore and P. R. Lynch
Biplane ventriculography was performed on nine intact anesthetized rats.
Images of the left ventricle large enough for analysis were obtained by
placing the rats close to the radiographic tubes (direct enlargement).
Sampling rates, adequate for heart rates of 500 beats/min, were obtained by
filming at 500 frames/s. From the digitized silhouettes of the left
ventricle the following information was obtained (means +/- SE):
end-diastolic volume 0.60 +/- 0.03 ml, end-systolic volume 0.22 +/- 0.02
ml, stroke volume 0.38 +/- 0.02 ml, ejection fraction 0.63 +/- 0.02,
cardiac output 118 +/- 7 ml/min, diastolic septolateral dimension 0.41 +/-
0.01 mm, diastolic anteroposterior dimension 0.40 +/- 0.01 mm, diastolic
base-to-apex dimension 1.58 +/- 0.04 mm. To determine the accuracy with
which the volume of the ventricle could be measured, 11 methyl methacrylate
casts of the left ventricle were made. The correlation was high (r = 0.99
+/- 0.02 ml E) between the cast volumes determined by water displacement
and by use of two monoplane methods (Simpson's rule of integration and the
area-length method applied to the analysis of the anteroposterior films)
and a biplane method (area-length). These results demonstrate that it is
possible to obtain accurate dimensions and volumes of the rat left
ventricle by use of high-speed ventriculography.
