Pulmonary hypertension in endomyocardial fibrosis with emphasis of its severity

Abstract

Eighty cases of pulmonary hypertension were found from 148 cases of endomycordial fibrosis studied by cardiac catheter. All were African patients the majority being Ugandans of Rwanda and Tanzania origin and a fair number of indigenous Ugandans. The vast majority of the cases came from districts around Kampala, which probably emphasizes more the importance of their proximity to the hospital than of actual clustering of the disease, although further epidemiologic study is required to throw light on this tendency to the apparent clustering. Pulmonary hypertension was common and it was particularly severe in left ventricular disease alone or when predominating in biventricular disease. Of 18 cases considered to have very severe pulmonary hypertension 8 had mitral incompetence. With regards to age and sex, below the age 20 years pulmonary hypertension was more frequent in the males than in the females while above 20 years of age there were more female than male cases. There were also more female than male cases in the severe pulmonary hypertension group where the age ranged from 11 to 50 years with a majority under 25 years.