[Painless myocardial ischemia in patients with post-infarction cardiosclerosis].

Holter monitoring, echocardiography and 201Tl myocardial scintigraphy were performed in 40 patients with postinfarction cardiosclerosis. The monitoring revealed silent myocardial ischemia (SMI), including 27 having SMI with concurrent anginal episodes, 7 with SMI alone. A direct correlation was found between the duration of SMI and silent myocardial infarction (r = 0.539; p less than 0.05). The patients with left ventricular failure and myocardial hypertrophy exhibited longer SMI, as evidenced by echocardiography. 201Tl myocardial scintigraphy revealed no relationship between the degree of SMI and the dimensions of a postinfarction scar. SMI was detected in 77.5% of the patients with postinfarction cardiosclerosis. The duration of SMI was longer with the presence of angina pectoris, left ventricular failure or myocardial hypertrophy.