ABSTRACT
The classification of pulmonary hypertension (PH) has gone through a series of changes since the first classification was proposed in 1973 (1). During the Fourth World Symposium on Pulmonary Hypertension held in 2008 in Dana Point, California, the consensus of an international group of experts was to maintain the general philosophy and organization of the previous Venice classification held in 2003 (2). Although the five major categories of PH were retained in the Dana Point classification, a number of important modifications were made to accurately reflect the information published over the past five years as well as to clarify some areas that were unclear in the previous classification. The Venice classification is listed in Table 1 and the new Dana Point classification is listed in Table 2.
