Analysis of Holter monitoring for detection of myocardial ischemia episodes

While the use of the 24 hour Holter monitoring for the detection of the cardiac arrhythmias and conduction disturbances is well established, its applicability to the monitoring of the ST segment and T wave for the detection of myocardial ischemia is controversial. For these reasons the Holter monitoring is mainly confined to the detection of cadiac arrhythmias and is used in those centers where computer facilities are available. We proposed to record the electrocardiographic tape replayed at 60 times the real time on a direct recording ultraviolet oscillograph running at low speed obtaining a fast compact analogue representation of the Holter recording where the 24 hour Holter recording is compressed into cm 480 of paper. The analogue compact representation described allows an easy detection of the transient displacement of the ST segment and/or changes in the T wave amplitude and direction and/or QRS pattern all due to myocardial ischemia without the use of any expensive computer facilities.