RT Journal
A1 GUERCIO L
T1 UNderlying flaws in the sarnoff curve-reply
JF Archives of Surgery
JO Archives of Surgery
YR 1979
FD September 1
VO 114
IS 9
SP 1093
OP 1093
DO 10.1001/archsurg.1979.01370330114031
UL http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/archsurg.1979.01370330114031
AB In Reply.—In response to Dr Antonio Boba's comments on Dr L. R. M. Del Guercio's comments on the article entitled "Hemodynamic effects of dopamine in septic shock with and without acute renal failure" (Archives 113:1414-1416, 1978), I believe it was Emile Zola who said, "To be simple is to be great." This is particularly true in the case of physiological and clinical concepts. Back in the 1950s, Stanley J. Sarnoff1 described a diagram that neatly displayed the Starling-Frank hypothesis of ventricular function. The original concept, derived from work in animals, has proved to be a valuable clinical tool in man. The Sarnoff ventricular function curve is great because it is simple and it works. Essentially, Dr Boba's complaint is that left ventricular stroke work, which is recorded on the ordinate, is not a single variable but rather the product of the blood pressure and the stroke volume and