Pulmonary Hypertension: Echocardiographic Assessment in Context: Tips and Tricks

Pulmonary Hypertension: Echocardiographic Assessment in Context: Tips and Tricks is organized by Canadian Cardiovascular Society (CCS).

Available Until: November 2025

Description:
This is the second session of the Pulmonary Hypertension: Medical and Imaging Updates Series, a multipronged evidence and needs-based Knowledge to Action (KTA) strategy that merges, scales, and improves upon the Pulmonary Hypertension KT program and the Canadian Society of Echocardiography’s Step Right Up program.

Learning Objectives
CanMEDS roles relevant to this activity: Medical Expert, Communicator, Collaborator, and Scholar

Overall Learning Objectives (Medical expert, Communicator, Collaborator, Scholar)

• Discuss the role of the echocardiogram in the diagnosis and management of patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension
• Apply basic and advanced echocardiographic skills in the assessment of patients presenting with symptoms consistent with PH
• Integrate key echocardiographic parameters in the clinical management of patients with PH

Individual Learning Objectives
Case Presentation – Kenneth Szeto (Medical Expert, Communicator, Collaborator, Scholar)

• Show requisition request and patient symptoms that sonographers may encounter in a pulmonary hypertension case
• Contrast two pulmonary hypertension cases and their echocardiographic findings

Echocardiography for Right Heart Assessment (Medical Expert, Communicator, Collaborator, Scholar)

How to perform – Heather Cooley:

• Describe how to perform and interpret a right heart assessment from an echocardiography

How to interpret – Dr. Amer Johri:

• Review the assessment of the right heart based upon the ASE Guidelines
• Review right heart echocardiographic image acquisition windows for the assessment of pulmonary hypertension

Challenges, Pitfalls, and How to Overcome – Dr. Lawrence Rudski (Medical Expert, Communicator, Collaborator, Scholar)

• Understand the limitations of echocardiography to estimate pulmonary pressures
• Review echocardiographic signs that suggest pulmonary hypertension in the absence of tricuspid regurgitation

Putting It All Together: Key Echo Information in the Clinical Context of the PH Patient – Dr. Nishad Hirani (Medical Expert, Communicator, Collaborator)

• Understand the role of the echocardiogram in the diagnosis and long-term follow up of patients with pulmonary arterial hypertension
• Integrate key echocardiographic parameters in the clinical management of patients with PAH