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Sub-clinical cardiac dysfunction may be significantly associated with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) with a different degree of severity. In a cross-sectional design we aimed to evaluate the frequency of left ventricular diastolic dysfunction (LVdd) and its correlation with lung function, pulmonary arterial pressure and systemic inflammation in a selected population of COPD at an early stage of their disease. Fifty-five COPD patients with no clinical signs of cardiovascular dysfunction were recruited and compared to 40 matched healthy controls. All the subjects underwent pulmonary function testing, doppler echocardiography, and interleukin-6 blood sampling. Presence of LVdd was defined according to the significant change in both the ratio between early and late diastolic transmitral flow velocity (E/A ratio), isovolumetric relaxation time (IVRT), and deceleration time (DT). The frequency of LVdd was higher in the COPD group (70.9 percent) compared to controls (27.5 percent). In these patients decreased E/A ratio, and prolonged IVRT and DT clearly pointed to left ventricular filling impairment, a condition we found to be especially severe in those patients suffering from lung static hyperinflation as expressed by inspiratory-to-total lung capacity ratio (IC/TLC)0.25. Circulating levels of interleukin-6 were also higher among COPD patients compared to controls. The results of the present study suggest that subclinical left ventricular filling impairment is frequently found in COPD patients at the earlier stage of the disease even in the absence of any other cardiovascular dysfunction. Doppler echocardiography may help the early identification of LVdd in COPD patients.

Systemic sclerosis (SSc) is a connective tissue disorder of unknown etiology that is often complicated by pulmonary involvement, with pulmonary hypertension (PH) and interstitial lung disease (ILD) being the major causes of death. It has been suggested that the amount of nitric oxide (NO) in exhaled air may predict the onset of complications. The aim of the study was to measure exhaled NO in SSc patients and investigate its relationship with pulmonary involvement with and without PH.Fifty patients (5 men and 45 women; mean age, 59.1 +/- 11.7 years [+/- SD]) with a diagnosis of SSc based on the preliminary criteria of the American Rheumatism Association, and 40 healthy control subjects (5 men and 35 women; mean age, 58.3 +/- 12.2 years) underwent exhaled NO measurements by means of a chemiluminescence analyzer, pulmonary function tests, high-resolution thorax CT, and Doppler echocardiography.Exhaled NO concentrations were significantly higher in SSc patients than control subjects (p = 0.02), and significantly lower in the patients with ILD and/or PH than in those without PH (p0.01). There was a significant inverse correlation between pulmonary artery systolic pressure and exhaled NO concentration in all of the studied patients (r = - 0.5, p0.001).Our results indicate that exhaled air NO concentrations are lower in SSc patients with lung involvement than in those without, and that SSc patients without ILD or PH have higher exhaled NO values than healthy subjects.