Echocardiographic assessment of radial right ventricular function in heart transplant recipients.

Short-axis fractional area change is a simple two-dimensional technique to assess RV function in HT recipients and showed no significant inter-observer variability. In our small, single-centre, retrospective case series, lower SAXFAC values were associated with clinically significant allograft rejection. The small sample size and infrequent occurrence of rejection make our observations hypothesis-generating only. We advocate dedicated RV SAXFAC imaging planes be included when assessing allograft function.