Interstitial Myocardial Fibrosis Assessed as Extracellular Volume Fraction with Low-Radiation-Dose Cardiac CT

PURPOSE: To develop a cardiac computed tomographic (CT) method with which to determine extracellular volume (ECV) fraction, with cardiac magnetic resonance (MR) imaging as the reference standard. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Study participants provided written informed consent to participate in this institutional review board-approved study. ECV was measured in healthy subjects and patients with heart failure by using cardiac CT and cardiac MR imaging. Paired Student t test, linear regression analysis, and Pearson correlation analysis were used to determine the relationship between cardiac CT and MR imaging ECV values and clinical parameters. RESULTS: Twenty-four subjects were studied. There was good correlation between myocardial ECV measured at cardiac MR imaging and that measured at cardiac CT (r = 0.82, P < .001). As expected, ECV was higher in patients with heart failure than in healthy control subjects for both cardiac CT and cardiac MR imaging (P = .03, respectively). For both cardiac MR imaging and cardiac CT, ECV was positively associated with end diastolic and end systolic volume and inversely related to ejection fraction (P < .05 for all). Mean radiation dose was 1.98 mSv ± 0.16 (standard deviation) for each cardiac CT acquisition. CONCLUSION: ECV at cardiac CT and that at cardiac MR imaging showed good correlation, suggesting the potential for myocardial tissue characterization with cardiac CT.