Cardiology Research Today is a free monthly online journal that collates and summarizes the latest research about Cardiology, including details on fitness, heart disease, medications.

Magnetic resonance imaging assessment of ventricular dyssynchrony: current and emerging concepts.

Lardo AC, Abraham TP, Kass DA

Division of Cardiology, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland 21205, USA. alardo@jhmi.edu

Despite the numerous documented benefits of cardiac resynchronization therapy (CRT), a significant proportion of patients undergoing CRT do not demonstrate symptomatic or morphologic improvement, triggering the search to improve targeting of this therapy. Many studies now support direct assessment of mechanical dyssynchrony as a method to better identify CRT responders. Among the methods used, echo-Doppler imaging has taken center stage and is covered in other articles in this special issue; however, these methods have several inherent limitations, and other alternatives are also being explored such as magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). This review discusses the concepts and clinical use of MRI methods for quantitative assessment of mechanical dyssynchrony, highlighting newer acquisition and analysis methods and focusing on how the data can be synthesized into robust indexes of dyssynchronous heart failure.

Published 19 December 2005 in J Am Coll Cardiol, 46(12): 2223-8.
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