Echocardiography occupies a pivotal position in contemporary cardiovascular medicine. The results of the echocardiographic examination have almost assumed a position alongside the vital signs and the electrocardiogram in the evaluation of the patient with or suspected of having cardiovascular disease. The ubiquity and utility of this examination have even given rise, among some medical trainees, to a mentality that seeks the results of the echocardiographic evaluation before seeing the patient!
Essential Echocardiography A Practical Handbook, lavishly illustrated and carefully selected, is a primer that illustrates the seamless coalescence of physics, instrumentation, hemodynamics, anatomy, and patho-physiology. Accurate but approachable, extensive but not exhaustive, this manual provides a practical but scholarly overview of the contemporary state of echocardiography. It should be useful to trainees, sonographers, and cardiologists who practice echocardiography as a daily pursuit.
The goal of Essential Echocardiography A Practical Handbook is to teach echocardiography to anyone learning the discipline. Although most previous echocardiography books have been designed either for physicians—generally cardiologists—or cardiac sonographers, the basic principles of echocardiography arethe same regardless of the learner. In the general practice of echocardiography, these distinctions blur.
Indeed, sonographers are often the first to make an important diagnosis; conversely, in many institutions, physicians, not sonographers, perform echocardiographic scans. Written by a variety of experts with a commitment to the education and training of sonographers, students, and cardiology fellows, all the chapters in Essential Echocardiography: A Practical Handbook With DVD are designed to be basic enough for the introductory student, but offer enough substance to serve as a reference for the more advanced practitioner.