Diastolic function is a complex process that simply refers to how well the heart performs during diastole, as blood is suctioned from the left atrium (LA) towards the apex of left ventricle (LV) at a low-pressure filling state. When the heart is unable to fill properly, filling pressures increase in order to allow proper filling and keep required cardiac output state. When these filling pressures increase, diastolic dysfunction occurs.
In the past weeks we had guest writer, Michael Owen, share how to assess diastolic dysfunction. He broke down the algorithm that ASE uses to evaluate the presence of dysfunction. The full ASE article is long and intense. Michael did a great job at simplifying the evaluation process. While featuring this Mastering Diastology series we started to receive a lot of questions. We realized that it would be helpful to take a step back and review the basics. All this great information regarding diastolic dysfunction means nothing to us unless we have a basic understanding of the topic and how it relates to our daily use. We are going to go back to the beginning. Let’s talk diastole!
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