The American Journal of Medicine Blog

A 33-year-old man with cystic fibrosis 220 days removed from bilateral lung transplantation presented with 1 week of intermittent fevers (maximum 102°F), malaise, bilateral lower extremity edema, unintentional weight gain (8 pounds), and 2 days of dyspnea on exertion. His posttransplant course was complicated by persistent leukopenia with intermittent neutropenia attributed to his antirejection regimen of […]

To the Editor: Radiation heart disease is associated with a high level of morbidity and mortality. Its natural history is not well understood. Its management is difficult. We report a case of radiation heart disease with dramatic disease progression over 11 years, captured on echocardiography. Case Report A 66-year-old woman presented with increasing dyspnea on […]

After an elective cystectomy, a 77-year-old man developed postoperative atrial fibrillation, resulting in a surprising new finding and a challenging diagnosis. He had no cardiovascular symptoms or cardiac history. The preoperative electrocardiogram was normal. Transthoracic echocardiogram identified a mass on the mitral valve (Figure 1A), new 3+ aortic valve regurgitation, and 2+ mitral valve regurgitation. Left ventricular […]

A new suspected cause of cryptic strokes is “silent atrial fibrillation.” Pacemakers and other implanted devices allow continuous recording of cardiac rhythm for months or years. They have discovered that short periods of atrial fibrillation lasting minutes or hours are frequent and usually are asymptomatic. A meta-analysis of 50 studies involving more than 10,000 patients […]

Portable echocardiographic devices were first introduced in 1978.1 As technology has evolved, they have become smaller and more comprehensive. At present, pocket echos (pocket-sized, hand-held cardiac ultrasounds), which cost less than $1000 can, in 5 to 10 minutes, produce data very similar to that obtained by a standard echo examination of the heart. At present (United […]