Structural and functional peculiarities of the cardiovascular system of athletes in the upright body position

Abstract

Aim. The article deals with establishing structural reasons for heart and vessels reaction to the upright body position in athletes. Materials and methods. Twelve professional athletes participated in the study (mean age 17.9 ± 6.4, body length - 168.8 ± 6.9 cm, body weight - 59.9 ± 9.6 kg). Participants underwent hemodynamics monitoring followed by standard transtho-racic echocardiography (TTE) and Doppler sonography in the supine and upright body position. Results. We found out that, in general, TTE parameters of all participants corresponded with standard values for adult athletes. Meanwhile, we revealed some structural and functional peculiarities of the cardiovascular system during the orthostatic test (upright position of the body). Conclusion. The change from the supine to upright body position results in the increase in heart rate and decrease in cardiac volumetric parameters. Moreover, higher ∆HR is associated with a significant decrease in volumetric parameters of the cardiovascular system. © 2018 Human Sport Medicine. All rights reserved.