Author(s)

P. Verdonck, P. Segers, R. Verhoeven & D. De Wachter

Abstract

With the advent of transesophageal echocardiography, pulmonary venous flow is easily obtained in all patients by pulsed-wave Doppler echocardio- graphy. Therefore it has become a current topic of clinical investigation as a part of an assessment of left ventricular filling dynamics. In order to understand the relation between left ventricular function and Doppler indices, a lumped parameter model of the flow through the left heart is developed. The model predicts the time course of pressure and flow in the pulmonary veins and the left heart chambers given pulmonary venous compliance, inertance and resistance, left atrial and ventricular stiffness and mitral valve impedance. A case study is presented. 1 Introduction Normal systolic function is the ability of the heart to

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