Does fast-SENC CMR strain imaging improve the diagnostic classification of heart failure stages compared to LVEF and RVEF in patients with non-ischemic cardiomyopathies?
Fast-SENC CMR assessment of LV and RV strain improves the early identification of subclinical heart failure in patients with non-ischemic cardiomyopathies compared to standard ejection fraction measurements.
AIMS: To compare the ability of left ventricular (LV) and right ventricular (RV) strain measured by fast-strain encoded cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) (fast-SENC) with LV- and RV-ejection fraction for the diagnostic classification of patients with different stages of chronic heart failure (stages A-D based on American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association guidelines) due to non-ischemic cardiomyopathies. METHODS: Our study population consisted of 276 consecutive patients who underwent CMR for clinical reasons, and 19 healthy subjects. Wall motion score index and non-infarct related late gadolinium enhancement (LGE), LV ejection fraction (LVEF) and RV ejection fraction (RVEF) and global LV- and RV-longitudinal (GLS) and circumferential strain (GCS) based on fast-SENC acquisitions, were calculated in all subjects. The percentage of LV and RV myocardial segments with strain ≤ - 17% (%normal LV and RV myocardium) was determined in all subjects. RESULTS: = 0.20 for %normal RV myocardium versus RVEF, respectively). Furthermore, %normal LV and RV myocardium exhibited incremental value for the identification of patients (i) with subclinical myocardial dysfunction and (ii) with symptomatic heart failure, surpassing that provided by LVEF and RVEF (ΔAUC = 0.22 for LVEF and ΔAUC = 0.19 for RVEF with subclinical dysfunction, and ΔAUC = 0.19 for LVEF and ΔAUC = 0.22 for RVEF with symptomatic heart failure, respectively, p < 0.001 for all). %normal LV myocardium reclassified 11 of 31 (35%) patients judged as having no structural heart disease by clinical and imaging data to stage B, i.e., subclinical LV-dysfunction. CONCLUSIONS: In patients with non-ischemic cardiomyopathy, %normal LV and RV myocardium, by fast-SENC, enables improved identification of asymptomatic patients with subclinical LV-dysfunction. This technique may be useful for the early identification of such presumably healthy subjects at risk for heart failure and for monitoring LV and RV deformation during pharmacologic interventions in future studies.
Steen et al. (Mon,) studied this question.