Ejection Fraction And Ventricular Hypertrophy
Ejection Fraction And Ventricular Hypertrophy
Pathfinder, I note that shortly after the operation, most people who had them still have high ejection fractions, because their ventricles have not yet reduced in size. Your ejection fraction was still in the normal range before the surgery, so you may not have experienced the dramatic LV enlargement that many people experience. The difference between the readings is not a surprise, as both the EF and the measurement vary with each reading. A healthy heart should be able to recover to an EF wthin th normal range.
Debbie, I would not consider your high ejection fraction to be a good thing at this point, based on the contents of your post. It might be good for a competition bicycle racer, but for most of us mortals, it's a symptom of our valve issues.
Here's a mildly edited version of one of my older posts, attempting to explain ejection fraction and the ventricular hypertrophy cycle...
Ejection Fractions fluctuate fairly easily, and can be misleading. They do change with anxiety, and sometimes even with the positioning of the heart during the echo. Like blood pressure, the number only becomes trustworthy with repetition. Unlike blood pressure readings, echoes can't be taken between office visits at home.
A high ejection fraction can be developed through atheletic pursuits. However, it's more often the case that it's a result of left ventricular hypertrophy, the muscular enlargement of the left ventricle that develops when the heart is put to severe service. With regurgitation or stenosis, the heart is pumping very hard to get the proper amount of blood to your body, as much of what it pumps out leaks back into the ventricle, or trying to exit into the aorta through a very narrow hole.
The ventricle, like other muscles, enlarges when it's worked harder. Think of it as a small hand, squeezing a small orange for juice. You might get half of the juice with a good squeeze. Imagine the orange in a somewhat larger and stronger hand. It can can get a better grip, squeeze harder, and get 70% of the juice out of the orange. More efficient.
Now imagine the little orange in a giant, Mickey Mouse-sized mitt. Suddenly, the hand is so large, it's too big to wrap tightly around the tiny citrus anymore, and no longer has the flexibility or leverage to compress the fruit evenly and push the juice out effectively. As the hand continues to grow, the once very high Juice Ejection Fraction suddenly plummets.
That's the cycle of valve-induced left ventricular hypertrophy that eventually ends in heart failure (call it "Mickey Mouse ventricle"). The left ventricle outgrows its ability to compensate for the valve leakage.
While it may sound good to have a high EF, when it's due to this type of problem, it's a sign of reaching the top of a slow cycle that has a bad ending (if there isn't surgical intervention). This is a cycle that the vast majority of aortic valve patients get at least partway through. It doesn't happen overnight. There's time to decide your best course.
There is much information in this site's Reference Sources forum. It's a good place to look for some basic information. It's good to keep an awareness of dates on the writings, as things change rapidly in the heart valve world. However, the issues you are researching are stable information, and shouldn't have that issue.
Best wishes,
