Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Notched and fragmented QRS in dogs with mitral valve disease
By Baisan, Radu Andrei et al.·Published in The veterinary quarterly·2021·Clinics Department·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Retrospective evaluation of notched and fragmented QRS complex in dogs with naturally occurring myxomatous mitral valve disease.
- Species:
- dog
Plain-English summary
A group of 155 dogs with myxomatous mitral valve disease (MMVD), a common heart problem, was studied to see if certain heart rhythm changes (notched and fragmented QRS complexes) were linked to the severity of their condition. The researchers found that 58% of these dogs had notched QRS complexes and 27% had fragmented ones, which were more common than in healthy dogs. However, the presence of these changes did not correlate with how severe the heart disease was. This means that while these heart rhythm changes are more frequent in dogs with MMVD, they don't necessarily indicate how advanced the disease is.
People also search for: dog heart disease symptoms · myxomatous mitral valve disease in dogs · notched QRS complex in dogs
Abstract
Myxomatous mitral valve disease (MMVD) is the most common cardiac disease in dogs. The association of QRS notching (nQRS) or fragmentation (fQRS) with disease severity is currently unknown. The study objective was to assess the prevalence of nQRS and fQRS in dogs with MMVD and its severity according to ACVIM classification and to compare the results with a group of healthy dogs. This retrospective cross-sectional study included 34 healthy control dogs and 155 dogs with spontaneous MMVD (42% of dogs in class B1, 23% in class B2 and 35% in class C). fQRS was defined as nQRS complexes in two contiguous leads in the frontal plane (leads I and aVL) and (II, III or aVF). A one-way ANOVA with Bonferroni post-hoc test was used to assess the differences in continuous data between control and MMVD groups. Of the MMVD group, 58% showed nQRS in at least one lead and 27% presented fQRS. There was no difference between the number of leads with a nQRS and disease severity ( = 0.75) nor did the number of leads with a nQRS correlate with left atrial size ( = 0.48; = 0.5). The number of dogs with fQRS did not differ among classes of MMVD ( = 0.21). nQRS and fQRS were more prevalent in dogs with MMVD compared to control dogs ( < 0.01). This study did not identify any relationship between the number of leads with a nQRS and disease severity. However, dogs with MMVD had a higher prevalence of nQRS and fQRS compared to control group.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34643161/