The Carey Coombs murmur or Coombs murmur is a
clinical sign
Signs and symptoms are the observed or detectable signs, and experienced symptoms of an illness, injury, or condition. A sign for example may be a higher or lower temperature than normal, raised or lowered blood pressure or an abnormality showin ...
which occurs in patients with mitral valvulitis due to acute
rheumatic fever
Rheumatic fever (RF) is an inflammatory disease that can involve the heart, joints, skin, and brain. The disease typically develops two to four weeks after a streptococcal throat infection. Signs and symptoms include fever, multiple painful jo ...
. It is described as a short, mid-diastolic rumble best heard at the
apex, which disappears as the valvulitis improves. It is often associated with an
S3 gallop rhythm
A gallop rhythm refers to a (usually abnormal) rhythm of the heart on auscultation. It includes three or four sounds, thus resembling the sounds of a Horse gait#Gallop, gallop.
The normal heart rhythm contains two audible heart sounds called S1 ...
, and can be distinguished from the diastolic murmur of
mitral stenosis by the absence of an opening snap before the murmur. It is audible at apex. The murmur is caused by increased blood flow across a thickened
mitral valve
The mitral valve (), also known as the bicuspid valve or left atrioventricular valve, is one of the four heart valves. It has two cusps or flaps and lies between the left atrium and the left ventricle of the heart. The heart valves are all one-w ...
.
[John Willis Hurst, Valentin Fuster, R. Wayne Alexander. ''Hurst's the Heart,'' page 1637. McGraw-Hill Professional, 2001. .]
The sign is named after
Carey Coombs
Carey Franklin Coombs (5 September 1879 – 9 December 1932) was a British cardiologist known for his work involving rheumatic heart disease and the eponymous Carey Coombs murmur.
Early life and education
Coombs was born in Castle Cary, So ...
who was a British cardiologist.
References
Heart murmurs
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