Effect of Major Lung Resection on Pulmonary Artery Pressure

Major lung resection is one of the surgical procedures which its significant physiologic and hemodynamic effects on the right heart have been recently studied. This study has been implemented to review the effects of this surgery on the most important echocardiographic index of the right heart that is pulmonary artery pressure (PAP). 29 patients were consecutively studied during 2 years. Each patient underwent a single transthoracic echocardiography before the operation and another echo study within one week after the operation. Background variables (age and sex) and echocardiographic indices (EF for global left heart function and PAP) were recorded. Analysis of data after review of distribution was done by paired-t-test and Wilcoxon signed rank test. In this study 18 men and 11 women with mean ±SD age of 52±21 were included. Mean ± SD of EF and PAP before the operation were 57.1±3.9 and 26.8±9.9 respectively. After the operation no significant changes in EF (p³1) was observed while PAP changed to 29.7±11.3 (p<0.086) The results showed that reduced pulmonary vascular bed after lobectomy and pneumonectomy did not affect left sided EF, while right sided index (PAP) was slightly elevated although not statistically significant. We can deduce that major lung resection does not affect cardiac outcome and PAP significantly; future studies with more patients and longer follow-ups will clarify this issue.)