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Cardiovascular Research 2005 67(2):184-186; doi:10.1016/j.cardiores.2005.05.027
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Copyright © 2005, European Society of Cardiology

The patient U wave

Chantal E. Conratha and Tobias Opthofb,c,*

aDepartment of Cardiology, University Medical Center, Utrecht, The Netherlands
bExperimental and Molecular Cardiology Groups, Academic Medical Center, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
cDepartment of Medical Physiology, University Medical Center, Utrecht, The Netherlands

* Corresponding author. Experimental and Molecular Cardiology Groups, Academic Medical Center, M0-107, Meibergdreef 9, 1105 AZ Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Tel.: +31 20 566 3265; fax: +31 20 697 5458. Email address: t.opthof@med.uu.nl

Received 23 May 2005; accepted 31 May 2005

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

See also article by Ritsema van Eck et al. [7] (pages 256–262) in this issue.


   1. Historical aspects
 
After having described the electrocardiogram in 1895 [1], Einthoven extended our notion of the ECG by mentioning the U wave in a later paper in the Lancet in 1912 [2]. Sandwiched between a paper on paratyphoid fever following meat poisoning and a paper on a ruptured kidney, Einthoven's seminal paper ended in two brief sentences: "The method of electrocardiography is still a young plant. We may reasonably expect that it will continue to bear good fruit" [2]. Einthoven died in 1927 after having earned the Noble Prize in 1924, and he could not foresee that, almost one century later, we still do not fully understand the relationship between cardiac repolarization and the T wave in the ECG, let alone the significance of the U wave...

Einthoven described the U wave as being . . . [Full Text of this Article]


   2. Significance of the U wave
 

   3. ‘Purkinje’ hypothesis
 

   4. ‘Mechanoelectrical feedback’ hypothesis
 

   5. ‘M cell’ hypothesis
 

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