Tuberc Respir Dis.  2004 Jan;56(1):67-76.

The Utility of Measurement of Plasma N-terminal Pro-brain Natriuretic Peptide in Diagnosis of Pulmonary Hypertension

• Hahn CH
• Kang SM
• Moon JW
• Cho JH
• Hwang SY
• Lee JM
• Park MS
• Chung JH
• Kim YS
• Kim SK
• Chang J
• Shim WH
• Kim SK

Abstract

BACKGROUND: Pulmonary hypertension is a poor prognostic factor in patients with chronic respiratory disease. However, diagnosing pulmonary hypertension is a difficult procedure which often requires an invasive test. Thus new alternative biochemical markers would be useful in clinical field and are in search. We sought to assess the role of plasma N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide(NT-proBNP) in patients with pulmonary hypertension. METHOD: We measured plasma NT-proBNP level in twenty nine patients suspected for pulmonary hypertension. Pulmonary hypertension was defined as being right ventricular systolic pressure more than 35 mm Hg estimated by Doppler echocardiography. Plasma NT-proBNP level was measured by electrochemiluminescence sandwich immunoassay.
RESULTS
The log-transformed values for plasma NT-proBNP levels showed a linear correlation (correlation coefficiency: 0.783, p-value <0.001) with right ventricular systolic pressure. Plasma NT-proBNP levels closely correlated with right ventricular systolic pressure, right ventricular hypertrophy, interventricular septal flattening and right ventricular dilatation.
CONCLUSION
Our results suggest that the measurement of plasma NT-proBNP level is an useful marker of the presence of pulmonary hypertension.

Keyword

N-terminal pro-brain natriuretic peptide; Pulmonary hypertension; Echocardiography

MeSH Terms

Biomarkers
Blood Pressure
Diagnosis*
Dilatation
Echocardiography
Echocardiography, Doppler
Humans
Hypertension, Pulmonary*
Hypertrophy, Right Ventricular
Immunoassay
Plasma*