Bedside Echocardiography Is Effective for Assessing Cardiac Function

The utility and safety of pulmonary artery catheters (PACs) have been questioned. A promising noninvasive method for assessing preload and cardiac function — the Bedside Echocardiographic Assessment in Trauma/Critical Care (BEAT) examination — was evaluated in a prospective, observational cohort analysis of consecutive trauma or of surgical patients who had PACs placed for hemodynamic monitoring.

Six critical care fellows or board-certified trauma surgeons who had completed 2 days of training conducted 85 BEAT exams in 22 patients using a 5- to 2-MHz cardiac ultrasound probe. Participants were blinded to PAC data, which were obtained immediately before each BEAT exam. Data obtained from the BEAT exam included left ventricular end-systolic an…