Biomedical Research

There is a paucity of data on aortic and heart dimensions of children and adolescents in Afri-cans. The aim of our study was to establish normal values of aortic, cardiac and thoracic diame-ters, and the cardiothoraic ratio in children and adolescents in a Nigerian population. The car-diothoracic ratio of 110 males and females aged between 5 and 19 were calculated from the car-diac and thoracic diameters in posteroanterior chest radiographs in a cross sectional study at a tertiary hospital. Prediction formulae were established for aortic and cardiac diameters. The means and standard deviations of aortic, cardiac and thoracic diameters and cardiothoraic ra-tio were established. The mean values of cardiothoracic ratio for males in the 5-9, 10-14 and 15-19 age groups were 47.7%, 45.7% and 44.1% respectively. The corresponding values for fe-males were 49.7%, 45.0% and 45.1%. The ratio decreased with age in both sexes. These values were larger than those reported for the Caucasians. Our study highlights the need for the use of standards based on local values for the evaluation of cardiovascular diseases in our population

Author(s): Obikili EN, Okoye IJ, Anyanwu GE
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