Roentgenological evaluation of cardiac function in radiotherapy of Hodgkin's disease

The roentgenofunctional evaluation of the cardiac status following mediastinal irradiation in patients with Hodgkin's disease was performed. The results of roentgenogrammetry revealed a decreased size of the cardiac shadow after treatment with the previous considerable enlargement of the mediastinal lymph nodes including also the tracheobronchial and bronchopulmonary ones. Roentgenokymographic results showed the changed myocardial contractility in the form of a decreased amplitude of the left, ventricular waves, of its conditional systolic discharge, deformation of the waves on a kymogram. The frequency of the development of myocardial changes depends on the total focal dose and increases at a dose of 40 Gy to the mediastinum. The increased number of cardiac contractions was noted after mediastinal irradiation at a total focal dose of 20 Gy