Comprehensive assessment of biventricular function and aortic stiffness in athletes with different forms of training by three-dimensional echocardiography and strain imaging

Abstract

In strength-trained, endurance-trained, and mixed-trained athletes, ventricular and vascular response assessed by 3DE, TDI, and STI underlies different adaptations of LV, RV, and aortic indexes.

Left Ventricular Speckle Tracking-Derived Cardiac Strain and Cardiac Twist Mechanics in Athletes: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis of Controlled Studies

“…Strain variables were identified from the 13 studies used for analysis: GLS ( n  = 10) [23, 28, 31–34, 36, 37, 53, 54], BCS ( n  = 6) [28, 31–34, 53], ACS ( n  = 6) [28, 31–34, 53], GCS ( n  = 4) [23, 28, 37, 54], GRS ( n  = 6) [23, 28, 31, 37, 53, 54], twist ( n  = 9) [10, 28, 30–34, 37, 53], basal rotation ( n  = 10) [10, 28, 30–34, 37, 38, 53], apical rotation ( n  = 9) [28, 30–34, 37, 38, 53], and untwisting velocity/rate ( n  = 8) [10, 30–34, 37, 53]. Where more than one athlete–control comparison was reported, this was documented as a separate comparison whereby the control n was divided by the number of comparisons available, leading to GLS ( n  = 14), BCS ( n  = 7), ACS ( n  = 7), GCS ( n  = 7), GRS ( n  = 9), twist ( n  = 13), basal rotation ( n  = 14), apical rotation ( n  = 13), PUV ( n  = 11), and UTR ( n  = 5) (Fig.…”

“…Despite numerous studies with competitive endurance athletes reporting increased structural adaptions [33, 37, 53], the lack of overall effect in twist mechanics could suggest that structural adaptions precede those of functional STE-derived indices in competitively trained athletes. However, in two of the studies, LV twist differed significantly between athletes and controls but in opposing directions [33, 37]; therefore, further data are necessary to expose the large heterogeneity in studies with competitive athletes to further establish the dose–response relationship between exercise training and twist mechanics.…”

“…Studies often used untwisting rate (UTR) to refer to peak untwisting velocity (PUV) [32, 34, 47], with peak UTR defined as the PUV occurring during early diastole [30, 48]. UTR has also been used to describe the rate of untwisting occurring during the earliest phases of diastole at timing events prior to mitral valve opening (MVO) [10, 37]. As terms are often used interchangeably, for the purposes of this meta-analysis, we separated the untwisting indices: peak untwisting markers were categorised as ‘PUV’—the largest negative deflection following peak twist velocity [49], whereas untwist (°/sec) determined at or prior to MVO were categorized as ‘UTR’ when clearly detailed.…”

“…Numerous cross-sectional investigations have attempted to establish the deformation profiles of athletes compared with controls; however, evidence has been conflicting and no overall consensus regarding exercise effects has been found [10, 23, 25–38]. These problems are not resolved when comparing functional adaptations using the traditional dichotomous classification of endurance and resistance athletes versus controls [23, 32, 35, 37]. One study broadly utilized the contemporary framework by subdividing Olympic athletes into four groups according to their predominant training characteristics (skill, power, mixed discipline, endurance) [26].…”

Left Ventricular Function Improve after Bench Press: A Speckle Tracking and 3D Echocardiography Study

“…The increase of S and SR has been described in other sports [5,6] even without detecting changes in LVEF [7]. Although it is accepted that an increase of S and SR occurs during exercise in elite athletes today do not know the behavior of the myocardial fibers in the non-elite athletes [8][9][10][11].…”