MRI for the assessment of pre-treatment regional cardiac dysfunction in thoracic cancer patients

Radiation therapy (RT) plays a key role in treating thoracic cancer, although the incidence of RT-induced cardiac complications could be as high as 33%. Nevertheless, characterization of baseline heart function, myocardial tissue characteristics and hemodynamic parameters in this patient population is not well elucidated, which was investigated in this study. The results revealed suboptimal cardiac function (both systolic and diastolic) and associations between different MRI cardiovascular parameters at baseline. Therefore, the condition of the cardiovascular system at baseline should be taken into consideration as a contributing factor in the development of RT-induced cardiotoxicity in thoracic cancer patients.