Background: Apical hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (apical HCM) is a less common subtype of HCM characterized by a focal thickening in the left ventricular apex. “Classic” ECG features have been described, however, apical HCM can persist for many years without detection. We investigated the relationship between ECG findings and echocardiographic morphometry in a large referral series of patients with apical HCM.
Methods: We enumerated all patients diagnosed with apical HCM prior to Sept. 30, 2006 using the Mayo Clinic HCM database. We compared echocardiographic measures separately for patients with positive status for two ECG indices of left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH); the Sokolow-Lyon index and the Romhilt-Estes (RE) point-score. We also compared echocardiographic measurements in patients with and without negative T-waves in the precordial leads.
Results: Apical HCM was detected in 177 patients (111 men and 68 women). Only 51% had positive Sokolow criteria and 51% had positive RE criteria. The agreement between Sokolow and RE status was high (agreement = 75.0%; kappa = 0.50; 95% CI = 0.38 – 0.62). In particular, Sokolow positive patients had increased LV ejection fraction (P = 0.02), and decreased LV end-systolic diameter (P = 0.03) compared with Sokolow negative patients. The prevalence of right atrial enlargement (47 vs. 28%; P = 0.02) and intracavity obstruction (22 vs. 8%; P = 0.01) were more common in Sokolow positive patients. Positive RE criteria was associated with a greater thickness of the basal septal and basal posterior walls (P = 0.001 and 0.02, respectively), and with a higher frequency of intracavity obstruction (21 vs. 9%; P = 0.04). Most patients (89%) exhibited at least one negative T-wave in the precordial leads; however, only 10% of patients had a negative T-wave of greater than 1.0 mV. We found that patients with an inverted T-wave larger than 0.4 mV (median) had a significantly increased LV ejection fraction (P = 0.03) compared with patients who had smaller or no negative T-waves.
Conclusions: Among patients with apical HCM, nearly half do not have ECG evidence of LVH based on classic criteria and most do not have marked T-wave inversions. However, the majority did have at least a mild expression of negative T-waves.
The association between T wave inversion and apical hypertrophic cardiomyopathy
