Clinical Usage of Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance Imaging: Single-Center Experience in the New Era of Cardiovascular Imaging

Introduction: Utilization of cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (CMRI) has been increasing year by year for the most cardiovascular diseases. In this paper, we documented a real-life experience of our center as a high-volume CMRI performing center. Methods: We have retrospectively analyzed the 100 patients who have undergone CMRI at our center during the last 1 year. All the preliminary diagnoses, specialty or subspecialty of referring physicians, patient characteristics and CMRI findings were analyzed. Results: In 87 of 100 scans, a gadolinium-based contrast agent was used and in none of these procedures neither complications nor adverse events related to the contrast agent has occurred. Among these 100 consecutive CMRIs were referred to by a clinical cardiologist, invasive cardiologists, heart failure specialist, cardiovascular imaging specialists, electrophysiologists, and other specialists. On referral from a clinical cardiologist, the CMRI findings were high consistency. In these patients, the biggest number of preliminary diagnoses belongs to hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. The most common MRI finding was reduced left ventricular ejection fraction. In 25 patients we observed extracardiac findings. Conclusion: CMRI is increasingly occurring in cardiovascular imaging and diagnosis of various cardiovascular diseases. CMRI not only produces high-resolution morphological images but also provides quantitative information on the severity of regurgitant or stenotic lesions in valvular diseases or cardiac shunts with the velocity and flow measurements.