143 Echocardiographic assessment of cardiac remodeling in the high-level football player

IntroductionThe aim of this study is to assess the morphological and hemodynamic cardiovascular changes of 24 high-level football players, using Doppler-echocar-diography, and compare them to a similar control group.Methods and resultsTwenty-four elite football players were matched to 24 normal subjects according to age, sex, and body surface. All participants had a clinical examination, resting ECG, Doppler-echocardiography and a measurement of maximal oxygen uptake (VO 2 max). The echocardiographic variables were compared between two groups by the Student's t-test and other statistical tests, using the SPSS 12 for Windows software. Compared to the control group, the wall thickness (10.49+1.04 vs. 7.5+2.04 mm, p<0.05), the LV end-diastolic diameter (57.1+3.70 vs. 41.2+3.65 mm, p<0.01) and left atrium surface (20.16+2.03 vs. 16.16+1.83 cm 2, p<0.01) were significantly more important in football players. The LV and RV ejection fractions were similar in both groups. The RV long-axis diastolic diameter (8+0.5 vs. 6.5+1.1 mm, p<0.01) and S-wave using DTI (0.17+0.02 vs. 0.14+0.02, p