Echocardiographic Classification of Hypertensive Heart Disease

Forty patients with systemic hypertension were classified into 4 types based on the left ventricular echocardiographic findings. Patients with normal left ventricular echogram, type I, showed little clinical symptoms and signs of hypertensive involvement. Higher systolic pressure and marked hypertensive retinal and renal changes were observed in patients with symmetric hypertrophy of the left ventricle, type II. Congestive heart failure was dominantly present in those with dilatation of the left ventricle, type IV. High voltages and marked ST-T changes in electrocardiogram were usually found in patients with asymmetric septal hypertrophy, type III, while retinal and renal damages were mild. Left ventriculograms obtained from 6 cases in type III also revealed hypertrophy of the interventricular septum and one of them demonstrated left ventricular outflow tract obstruction. These cardiac features in type III, which are quite similar to those in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, seemed to be a secondary change induced by systemic hypertension on the basis of some predisposition.