Reference Intervals for Echocardiography Parameters of Children Living in the Arkhangelsk Region and a Digital Application for Their Assessment

Objective interpretation of echocardiography results in the paediatric population is an urgent issue due to the difficulties in identifying the correct cardiovascular allometric relationship. A wide use of existing echocardiographic nomograms in paediatric cardiology is problematic due to the lack of clear data on the subjects’ regional affiliation, the volume of samples analysed, and the insufficient number of Russian studies in this sphere. The purpose of the study was to develop reference intervals for echocardiography parameters of children living in the Arkhangelsk Region and to automate the process of interpretation of the results by creating a digital application. Materials and methods. We analysed 3811 echocardiography protocols of children living in the Arkhangelsk Region aged from 1 to 15 years with no signs of organic pathology of the cardiovascular system or heart rhythm disorders. Results. Using echocardiography data, we developed reference intervals for morphometric parameters of the heart for children aged 1 to 15 years living in the Arkhangelsk Region. The research applied the Z-score approach based on the empirical determination of the degree of abnormalities by the standard deviation from normal values obtained during the examination of a large population of healthy individuals. Reference intervals of echocardiography parameters were determined using body surface area as the dependent variable. The values were automatically calculated in our digital application that allows one to increase the accuracy and efficiency of interpretation of cardiac ultrasound parameters. The results of studying the differences between the reference values in Russian and foreign studies and the obtained regional norms indicate that the hearts of children living in the Arkhangelsk Region are statistically significantly smaller in size. The practical use of the digital application created by us in functional diagnostics will allow doctors to objectivize the measurements of morphometric parameters of the heart and reduce overdiagnosis.