Introduction to basic transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) and standard views

Intraoperative use of transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) for monitoring and diagnostic purposes has increased over the years in cardiac surgical patients and anaesthesiologists have taken a lead to develop expertise in performing this examination. TEE has proved to be helpful in the management of non-cardiac surgical and Intensive care unit patients particularly those patients who are haemodynamically unstable. It provides important information about ventricular and valvular anatomy and its function. Certain structures which are difficult to visualize by transthoracic echocardiography can be demonstrated easily by TEE. Several guidelines have been established for performing comprehensive TEE examination and cardiologists and anaesthesiologists follow these guidelines to identify any cardiovascular abnormality. TEE use is limited to very few centres in Pakistan, mainly due to the equipment cost and lack of expertise. In addition, there are no established TEE training institutes. The main purpose of this article is to provide basic information about transesophageal echocardiography machine, TEE probe and how to obtain standard images by probe manipulation.