A stress echocardiogram is a test that allows your health care provider to see how your heart muscle works both when you are resting and when your heart is stressed.

The heart can be stressed with exercise. It can also be stressed with drugs that increase the heart rate or change the way blood flows through the coronary arteries.

Images of the beating heart are made by bouncing high-frequency (ultrasound) sound waves off the heart.

A computer uses the echoes of the sound waves to create a moving picture of the heart. All of the heart structures, including the heart muscle and heart valves, can be carefully examined.