Gender-related cardiac dimension differences between female and male professional soccer players

The aim of this study was to determine if cardiac hypertrophy differs between professional female and male soccer players. Twenty-two female and 20 male professional soccer players, and their respective non-athlete controls (22 females and 19 males) were submitted to an echocardiogram. Females had a shorter left ventricular intracavitary diameter and wall thicknesses than males in both groups. However, these differences disappeared when cardiac dimensions were expressed relative to body mass area (P>0.05). Compared to their respective controls, female and male soccer players had a longer (P