Assessment of Speckle Tracking Strain Predictive Value for Myocardial Fibrosis in Chagas Disease

One of the most challenging issues of chronic Chagas disease is to provide earlier detection of heart involvement. Two-dimensional speckle tracking (2-D ST) echocardiography, a new imaging modality with useful applications in several cardiac diseases, has been validated for subjects with myocardial infarction against cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR). Here the investigators hypothesize that the longitudinal global strain (LGS) has an incremental value to ejection fraction for predicting myocardial fibrosis in subjects with Chagas disease.