Abstract

Left Ventricular Hypertrophy (LVH) is an adaptive state of the heart to increase the wall stress. It is common in hypertension. The prevalence of LVH increases with the age, severity of hypertension and the duration of hypertension. So, presence of LVH indicates a long run of uncontrolled hypertension.
There are many ways of diagnosing LVH like by electrocardiography (ECG), roentgenography and echocardiography (ECHO). Though ECHO is superior to ECG, it is economically expensive and not widely available in rural parts of our country.
Left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) is widely recognized as an independent and significant predictor of cardiovascular disease (CVD) and sudden cardiac death (SCD) as risk factor.
It is also assumed that the predictive value of LVH is increased by its accurate assessment based on LV mass (LVM). However, LVH definition along with LVM reference values, demonstrate wide variability among imaging modalities, technicians, indexing methods and institutions.
In addition, currently autopsy studies measure total heart weight rather than LVM, which makes them difficult to correlate with imaging data. Therefore, we conducted a systematic literature review for existing data on methods used and reference values for both normal and diseased hearts.
Echocardiography remains the most widely used diagnostic tool for the evaluation of LVH, with the optimal body-size indexing formula remaining controversial and in urgent need of more standardization Future forensic studies are needed to directly compare total cardiac mass to left ventricular mass and in order to update reference values considering significant changes in the population's height and weight