Study design and population
The study is a retrospective analysis of echocardiographic findings in
healthy normal controls that formed part of a study (M170389) conducted
at Chris Hani Baragwanath Academic Hospital (CHBAH). The inclusion
criteria for the prior study included: (i) absence of cardiovascular
symptoms, (ii) normal blood pressure (≤140/90 mmHg), (iii) absence of
diabetes and cardiovascular disease, (iv) not on any chronic medication,
and (vi) presence of sinus rhythm (heart rate between 50 and 85 b.p.m).
The exclusion criteria were pre-existing: (i) cardiovascular diseases,
(ii) pulmonary diseases, (iii) previous abnormal echocardiography, (iv)
congenital heart diseases, (v) cardiac pathology detected by
echocardiography, (vi) sinus tachycardia (vii) inadequate
echocardiographic image quality, and (viii) athlete.