Author(s)

Arfaat Khan, Eduardo Valdiviezo, Gurjit Singh, Somsupha Kanjanauthai, Waheeda Nazneen, Karthik Ananthasubramaniam

Heart and Vascular Institute, The Department of Internal Medicine, Henry Ford Hospital, Detroit, USA.

Background: The predictive value of Dobutamine Stress Echocardiography (DSE) in the obese African American patient population is not well known. Methods: We conducted a retrospective study of 555 African American patients between 1/1/2001-12/31/2001. DSE responses were classified into normal, ischemia, scar, or scar +/? ischemia. End-points utilized were all cause death (ACD) and major adverse cardiac events (MACE). Results: There were a total of 409 obese patients and 146 non-obese patients. By multi-variate analysis only the scar group in the obese population predicted ACD (p = 0.003) and combined MACE (p = 0.014). Kaplan Meir analysis demonstrated that only the scar group was associated with decrease in freedom from all cause death (p < 0.001) and combined MACE (p < 0.001). Conclusion: DSE retains its prognostic power in the obese African American population and scar has important impli-cations for MACE.

African American; Obesity; Stress Echocardiography; Dobutamine Stress Echocardiography; Outcomes

A. Khan, E. Valdiviezo, G. Singh, S. Kanjanauthai, W. Nazneen and K. Ananthasubramaniam, "Prognostic Utility of Dobutamine Stress Echocardiography in the Obese African American Population," Open Journal of Medical Imaging, Vol. 2 No. 2, 2012, pp. 50-56. doi: 10.4236/ojmi.2012.22009.