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[Echocardiography in Spain. Survey of the Working Group of the Echocardiography and other Imaging Techniques of the Spanish Society of Cardiology].

INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVES
Echocardiography has become the technique of choice in the diagnosis of most heart diseases, but results are considerably influenced by the experience of the echocardiographer and quality of the equipment. The Work Group of Spanish Echocardiography has conducted a survey to ascertain the activity and technical and human resources of echocardiography in Spain.


METHODS
The survey was sent by mail to the 420 members of the Work Group and to the 120 echocardiographic laboratories of hospitals with more than 300 beds.


RESULTS
The survey was answered by 25% of the members and by 90% of the echocardiographic laboratories. The most of the echocardiographers who answered the survey performed more than 20 studies a week and did both echocardiography in addition to other clinical activities. In the survey directed at laboratories, 48 responded from tertiary hospitals and 46 from secondary centres. Personnel of tertiary hospital laboratories usually includes two or more cardiologists, two nurses or auxiliary nurses, but less than half have a full-time secretary. Transesophageal echocardiography is performed in 76% of the laboratories and stress echocardiography in 46%. The number of studies performed per machine per week ranges from 35 to 50, depending on the type of study and diseases studied. The delay in performing studies in hospitalised patients is less than 3 days; however, the waiting list of out-patients exceeds 6 months in 50% of the tertiary hospitals. Nevertheless, only 11% of the centres work in the morning and the afternoon. Although 33% of the equipment in the public hospitals is over 5 years old, great efforts are being made to acquire new machines; 62% of laboratories have harmonic imaging machines.


CONCLUSIONS
The important increase in the demand for echocardiography in clinical practice has not been accompanied by consequent increase in human and technological resources and this significant changes are required in the near future to fulfil laboratory resources and management.