Magnetic resonance imaging in valvular heart disease: Clinical application and current role for patient management

Noninvasive imaging provides important information on cardiac anatomy and function and is a key element in clinical management of valvular heart disease (VHD). Beside echocardiography, which is still considered the first-line modality for assessment of valvular anatomy and longitudinal evaluation of VHD, cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) has evolved during the last two decades as an essential tool for evaluation of cardiac diseases. Today, CMR not only represents the reference standard for measuring cardiac volumes, function, and mass, but also enables accurate assessment of morphology and function of cardiac valves. It can play an important role in clinical decision-making for patients with VHD. This review addresses current applications and limitations of CMR imaging techniques that are used in VHD including cine-balanced steady-state free precession (b-SSFP), phase contrast MR (pcMR), gradient-recalled echo (GRE), and turbo-spin echo (TSE) sequences. Moreover, it describes their application for evaluation of valvular pathologies and gives an overview on the current role of valvular CMR in patient management.