Prevalence of late ventricular potentials in patients with chronic obstructive lung disease

OBJECTIVE we studied the prevalence and characteristics of late ventricular potentials (LVP) in patients with chronic obstructive lung disease (COPD) comparative with normal subjects. MATERIAL AND METHOD LVP were registered noninvasively at 90 patients. We compared the parameters of LVP in 30 patients with COPD stage 0-IIA (group A) and 30 patients stage IIB and III (group B) with 30 normal patients (group C). RESULTS in group A, LVP were present in three cases (10%), in group B in eight cases (26.6%) and in group C in one case (3.3%). CONCLUSIONS our study suggests a significant difference in the parameters and in the prevalence of LVP in patients with COPD, in moderate-to-severe cases, comparative with normal patients.