STRESS ECHOCARDIOGRAPHY

Stress echocardiography has a number of advantages over exercise elect rocardiography. It has superior sensitivity and specificity as it dete cts wall motion abnormalities, an earlier and more specific marker for myocardial ischaemia than ST segment depression. It can also localise ischaemia and identify hibernating myocardium. Compared with radionuc lide imaging, stress echocardiography has similar accuracy but is chea per and does not involve exposure to ionising radiation. The disadvant age of stress echocardiograph is that it requires expertise and specia list experience of at least 100 studies. Current research aims at impr oving objective methods of analysing results. The technique is justifi ably being adopted throughout the UK.