Noninvasive and Simple Assessment of Cardiac Output and Pulmonary Vascular Resistance With Whole-Body Impedance Cardiography Is Useful for Monitoring Patients With Pulmonary Hypertension

Background: Right heart catheterization (RHC) is the gold standard for the diagnosis of pu lmonary hypertension (PH) and a useful tool for monitoring PH . However, there are some disadvantages in the regular use of RHC because it is invasive . Noninvasive methods for monitoring hemodynamics are needed to manage patients with PH. In this study, we aimed to evaluate the reliability of noninvasive hemodynamic assessment with whole-body impedance cardiography (Non-Invasive Cardiac System [NICaS]) for PH. Methods and Results: We investigated 55 consecutive patients undergoing RHC. Two- thirds of them had pulmo­ nary arterial hypertension and one-third had chronic thromboembolic PH ; 25% of the patients were receiving medi­ cal therapy. Cardiac output (CO) was estimated by NICaS (NI-CO), thermodilution (TO-CO), and the Fick method (Fick-CO). There was a strong correlation between NI-CO and TO-CO (r=O.715. P