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A difficult case
Life and death diagnosis
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  • Published on: 14 April 2016
    Formula given in this paper cannot be used to calculate the QTc

    The formula given in this paper can only be used to calculate a QTc if the variables QT and RR are entered as time measured in seconds.

    The RR is not the "heart beat in beats per min". It is the time elapsing between R wave peaks eg ten small squares which equals 0.4 seconds.

    Sadly, despite the obvious good intentions of this paper, any neurologist who follows the instructions to calculate the QTc wil...

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    Conflict of Interest:
    None declared.
  • Published on: 14 April 2016
    diagnostic accuracy is required also for the short QT syndrome

    Accurate measurement of the QT interval is relevant, not only for the diagnosis of long QT interval syndromes(1), but also for the recognition of short QT syndromes which are familial disorders now recognised to be characterised by complications such as a trial fibrillation, syncope, and sudden death, in the absence of structural heart disease(2)(3). The typical electocardiographic "signature" is a short QT interval associate...

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    Conflict of Interest:
    None declared.
  • Published on: 14 April 2016
    another moral from the cautionary tale

    The cautionary tale of miscalculation of the corrected QT interval(1) highlights the extent to which clinicians and their patients can become hostages to fortune when they base important clinical decisions on "numbers" churned out by electronic gadgets whose validity has not been "cross checked" manually. The sometimes indiscriminate use of oscillometric devices for blood pressure measurement is another case in point. My anx...

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    Conflict of Interest:
    None declared.

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