Background: The prevalence of early repolarization (ER) pattern in standard12-lead electrocardiography is as high as 13% in the general population. Although ER pattern was considered to be a benign electrocardiographic variant, several case–control and epidemiological studies have shown that it is associated with an increased risk of idiopathic ventricular fibrillation (VF) and death.
Objective: To detect whether there is any abnormality in the myocardial deformation parameters (global longitudinal strain and circumferential strain) of the left ventricle using 2D Speckle Tracking Echocardiography (STE) in individuals with early repolarization pattern.
Patients and methods: This was a prospective observational study that was conducted from January 2019 to June 2020 and included 60 cases recruited from General Transport Authority Hospital pre-employment files, with 30 patients with early repolarization pattern as a study group, and 30 individuals without early repolarization pattern as a control group who underwent conventional and 2D speckle tracking echocardiography.
Results: There was no statistically significant difference between groups according to age and BMI. The mean age of control and ER groups were 26.90±3.53&25.30±4.40 respectively. Heart rate was higher in subjects with ER pattern (73.03±6.17 & 79.03±7.95 for control and ER groups respectively).There was a statistically significant difference between their studied groups regarding E/E' (6.58±0.66 Vs 5.53±0.81) for control and ER groups respectively. There was no statistically significant difference between groups according to LV longitudinal strain (-21.3±1.62 Vs -19.73±2.35) for control and ER groups respectively. There was no statistically significant difference between groups according to LV circumferential strain (-18.97±1.03 Vs -20.73±2.18) for control and ER groups respectively.
Conclusion: In healthy subjects with ER pattern, LV myocardial deformation by STE was comparable to control group with no statistically significant differences between both groups. There was no correlation between global longitudinal and circumferential strains and age, body mass index, heart rate, LV mass index, diastolic parameters and ejection fraction.