2025 Expert Consensus Recommendations for the Diagnostic Requirements in Routine Practices of Transthoracic Echocardiography

Overview

Journal Acta Cardiol Sin

Date 2025 Jan 8

PMID 39776929

Authors

Meiling Chen

Wen-Huang Lee

Cheng-Hui Lu

Hao-Chih Chang

Cheng-Chang Tung

Yih-Ying Siow

Hsiang-Chun Lee

Chun-Li Wang

Kuo-Chun Hung

Wei-Chuan Tsai

Wen-Chung Yu

Lung-Chun Lin

Hsin-Yueh Liang

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Transthoracic echocardiography plays a crucial role in clinical diagnosis and is increasingly being used around the world. Comprehensive echocardiographic examinations require accurate measurements and the operators to have excellent technical skills. Despite the availability of several published echocardiographic guidelines, the absence of recommended operational manuals in daily practice has resulted in significant variation in the content of echocardiography reports across different medical institutions. This variability has created communication barriers between medical institutions and also hampered the development of a national echocardiography database in Taiwan. Balancing quality and efficiency is a critical concern in echocardiography, and most published guidelines for echocardiography primarily focus on disease categorization. In the current document, we focus on information about the scanning sequence, including scanning techniques, common pitfalls, simple disease interpretation, and the recommended intensity. Based on a growing body of research, we particularly emphasize right-sided imaging and measurement information. We also discuss equipment settings, which have often been overlooked but are essential to obtaining good imaging and accurate measurements. Our recommendations could enhance clinicians' and sonographers' understanding of the core aspects of echocardiography and were developed with consideration of the health-care payment system in Taiwan. Implementing our recommendations may subsequently enable the establishment of a national echocardiography database in Taiwan.

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