COVID-19 myocarditis: Features of echocardiography

Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) myocarditis constitutes an important cardiac complication in the intensive care setting. In this context, bedside transthoracic echocardiography (TTE) represents the first-lineimagingexam both to diagnose myocarditis and to stratify prognosis through targeted therapeutic interventions in COVID-19 patients (Picard & Weiner, 2020). During the COVID-19 pandemic, TTE was characterized by a high contagion risk due to closer contact to patients; preventive measures should have been adopted in critical care units (Cameli et al., 2020). This chapter will discuss the role of TTE in COVID-19 myocarditis from two-dimensional (2D) echocardiographic features to the most recent tools, such as speckle tracking echocardiography (STE) and myocardial work (MW) analysis. The last part of this chapter will focus on the right ventricle (RV) involvement in COVID-19 patients and the use of conventional 2D parameters complemented by new echocardiographic applications, such as STE or 3D ejection fraction, to detect RV dysfunction.