gms | German Medical Science

33rd International Congress on Electrocardiology

International Society of Electrocardiology

The Heart In Accidental Hypothermia –Electrocardiographic, Clinic And Morphopatologic Particularities

Meeting Abstract

  • corresponding author presenting/speaker R. Avram - Emergency Hospital, Timisoara, Rumänien
  • D. Sandesc - Emergency Hospital, Timisoara, Rumänien
  • A. Enache - Emergency Hospital, Timisoara, Rumänien
  • V. Ciobanu - Emergency Hospital, Timisoara, Rumänien
  • V. Moga - Emergency Hospital, Timisoara, Rumänien
  • M. Balint - Emergency Hospital, Timisoara, Rumänien
  • F. Parv - Emergency Hospital, Timisoara, Rumänien
  • C. Popa - Emergency Hospital, Timisoara, Rumänien

33rd International Congress on Electrocardiology. Cologne, 28.06.-01.07.2006. Düsseldorf, Köln: German Medical Science; 2007. Doc06ice143

The electronic version of this article is the complete one and can be found online at: http://www.egms.de/en/meetings/ice2006/06ice143.shtml

Published: February 8, 2007

© 2007 Avram et al.
This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/deed.en). You are free: to Share – to copy, distribute and transmit the work, provided the original author and source are credited.


Outline

Text

Introduction: Accidental hypothermia is still a difficult pathology in emergency department in geographic areas with cold weather.

Methods and results: We proposed to study electrocardiographic abnormalities correlated with clinical and histological ones. The clinical model consisted of 9 patients (2 women, 7 men) with age between 32-65 years hospitalized in Intensive Care Unit and Cardiology Department during 2003-2005 with rectal temperature between 25-320C (77-89,6 F). 6 patients were alcoholics, 2 with psychiatric therapy, 2 had a severe respiratory pathology. 4 patients had third degree atrio-ventricular block and 4 patients severe sinusal bradycardia. In 5 patients we found QT interval prolonged and Osborn wave. 8 patients (88,88%) died. Autoptic and histological exams showed global cardiomegaly in 4 patients, hemorrhagic subendocardic lesions in 5 patients and microscopic infarctions in 2 patients.

Conclusions: Electrocardiographic abnormalities (conduction disturbances, Osborn wave) seem to have a greater specificity than morphologic alterations that are non-specific, connected to the particular clinical status in accidental hypothermia.

Key words: accidental hypothermia, Osborn wave, heart