Left Atrial Mechanics Following Preeclamptic Pregnancy.

BACKGROUND: Preterm preeclampsia is a pregnancy complication associated with myocardial dysfunction and premature cardiovascular disease morbidity and mortality. Left atrial (LA) strain is a noninvasive index of left ventricular end diastolic pressure and an early marker of heart failure risk. This study aimed to evaluate LA strain during the postpartum period in participants with and without preterm preeclampsia and to assess whether this varied in the presence of hypertension, cardiac dysfunction or both. METHODS: In this longitudinal cohort study, 321 women from 28 hospitals with preterm preeclampsia (cases) underwent cardiovascular assessment 6 months postpartum. This is a secondary analysis of the PHOEBE study (ISRCTN01879376). An uncomplicated pregnancy control group (n=30) was recruited from a single center for comparison. A full cross-sectional transthoracic echocardiogram was performed, and from these images, the myocardial strain of the left atrium, including reservoir, conduit, and contractile strain, as well as LA stiffness, were calculated. RESULTS: At 6 months postpartum, compared with controls, prior preeclampsia was associated with a significantly attenuated LA reservoir, conduit, and contractile strain, as well as increased LA stiffness (all P<0.001). LA strain was further reduced in preeclamptic women who had and had not developed hypertension, systolic, or diastolic dysfunction at 6 months postpartum (all P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS: LA mechanics were significantly attenuated at 6 months postpartum in participants with preterm preeclampsia, whether or not they remained hypertensive or had evidence of ventricular dysfunction. Further studies are needed to determine whether postnatal LA strain may identify women at greater risk for future cardiovascular disease.

Multicenter Cohort Study, With a Nested Randomized Comparison, to Examine the Cardiovascular Impact of Preterm Preeclampsia.

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High-sensitive troponin is associated with subclinical imaging biosignature of inflammatory cardiovascular involvement in systemic lupus erythematosus.

BACKGROUND: Cardiovascular (CV) involvement in patients with systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) is presumably subclinical for the major part of its evolution. We evaluated the associations between high-sensitive troponin T (hs-TropT), a sensitive marker of myocardial injury, and CV involvement using cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR). METHODS AND RESULTS: This is a two-centre (London and Frankfurt) CMR imaging study at 3.0 Tesla of consecutive 92 patients with SLE free of cardiac symptoms, undergoing screening for cardiac involvement. Venous samples were drawn and analysed post-hoc for cardiac biomarkers, including hs-TropT, high-sensitive C reactive protein and N-terminal pro brain natriuretic peptide. Compared with age-matched/gender-matched non-SLE controls (n=78), patients had significantly raised cardiac biomarker levels, native T1 and T2, aortic and ventricular stiffness, and reduced global longitudinal strain (p<0.01). In SLE, hs-TropT was significantly and independently associated with native T2, followed by the models including native T1 and aortic stiffness (Χ2 0.462, p<0.01). There were no relationships between hs-TropT and age, gender, CV risk factors, duration of systemic disease, cardiac structure or function, or late gadolinium enhancement. CONCLUSIONS: Patients with SLE have a high prevalence of subclinical myocardial injury as demonstrated by raised high-sensitive troponin levels. CMR with T2 mapping reveals myocardial oedema as the strongest predictor of hs-TropT release, underscoring the inflammatory interstitial remodelling as the main mechanism of injury. Patients without active myocardial inflammation demonstrate diffuse interstitial remodelling and increased vascular stiffness. These findings substantiate the role of CMR in screening of subclinical cardiac involvement. TRIAL REGISTRATION NUMER: NCT02407197; Results.

Contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging for the detection of ruptured coronary plaques in patients with acute myocardial infarction.

PURPOSE: X-ray coronary angiography (XCA) is the current gold standard for the assessment of lumen encroaching coronary stenosis but XCA does not allow for early detection of rupture-prone vulnerable plaques, which are thought to be the precursor lesions of most acute myocardial infarctions (AMI) and sudden death. The aim of this study was to investigate the potential of delayed contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance coronary vessel wall imaging (CE-MRCVI) for the detection of culprit lesions in the coronary arteries. METHODS: 16 patients (13 male, age 61.9±8.6 years) presenting with sub-acute MI underwent CE-MRCVI within 24-72h prior to invasive XCA. CE-MRCVI was performed using a T1-weighted 3D gradient echo inversion recovery sequence (3D IR TFE) 40±4 minutes following the administration of 0.2 mmol/kg gadolinium-diethylenetriamine-pentaacetic acid (DTPA) on a 3T MRI scanner equipped with a 32-channel cardiac coil. RESULTS: 14 patients were found to have culprit lesions (7x LAD, 1xLCX, 6xRCA) as identified by XCA. Quantitative CE-MRCVI correctly identified the culprit lesion location with a sensitivity of 79% and excluded culprit lesion formation with a specificity of 99%. The contrast to noise ratio (CNR) of culprit lesions (9.7±4.1) significantly exceeded CNR values of segments without culprit lesions (2.9±1.9, p<0.001). CONCLUSION: CE-MRCVI allows the selective visualization of culprit lesions in patients immediately after myocardial infarction (MI). The pronounced contrast uptake in ruptured plaques may represent a surrogate biomarker of plaque activity and/or vulnerability.

Native T1 and T2 mapping by CMR in lupus myocarditis: Disease recognition and response to treatment.

BACKGROUND: Lupus myocarditis is likely more common than recognized clinically due to non-specific symptoms and lack of reliable non-invasive diagnostic tests. We investigated the role of native T1 and T2 in recognition of active myocardial inflammatory involvement in patients with systemic lupus erythematous (SLE). METHODS: 76 patients with clinically suspected lupus myocarditis (14 males, age: 44±16years) underwent quantitative tissue characterization with native T1 and T2 mapping. Normotensive healthy subjects taking no medication served as controls (n=46). Follow-up CMR studies were performed in a total of 35 subjects of which 14 patients received intensified anti-inflammatory treatment, as guided by SLE disease activity. RESULTS: Compared to controls SLE patients had higher inflammatory markers, LV mass, native T1 and T2 values, and reduced longitudinal strain (p<0.01). In patients with a positive troponin test (n=36; 46%), native T1 and T2 were significantly higher (p<0.01) with otherwise similar proportions of diffuse perimyocardial LGE (33%) and pericardial effusion (32%). Sixty-nine patients (83%) had an abnormal native T1, whereas 51 (71%) met diagnostic criteria for acute myocarditis. Follow-up CMRs revealed significantly greater reduction in native T1 and T2 values in patients with intensified anti-inflammatory treatment (p<0.001) with the greatest change observed within the first follow-up period and plateauing thereafter. Native T1 and T2 were significant predictors of treatment response. CONCLUSIONS: Native T1 and T2 mapping support recognition of lupus myocarditis and reflect the response to anti-inflammatory treatment. Native T1 and T2 mapping may support an effective, noninvasive, radiation- and gadolinium contrast-free screening method for lupus myocarditis.

High-resolution magnetic resonance myocardial perfusion imaging at 3.0-Tesla to detect hemodynamically significant coronary stenoses as determined by fractional flow reserve.

OBJECTIVES: The objective of this study was to compare visual and quantitative analysis of high spatial resolution cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) perfusion at 3.0-T against invasively determined fractional flow reserve (FFR). BACKGROUND: High spatial resolution CMR myocardial perfusion imaging for the detection of coronary artery disease (CAD) has recently been proposed but requires further clinical validation. METHODS: Forty-two patients (33 men, age 57.4 ± 9.6 years) with known or suspected CAD underwent rest and adenosine-stress k-space and time sensitivity encoding accelerated perfusion CMR at 3.0-T achieving in-plane spatial resolution of 1.2 × 1.2 mm(2). The FFR was measured in all vessels with >50% severity stenosis. Fractional flow reserve <0.75 was considered hemodynamically significant. Two blinded observers visually interpreted the CMR data. Separately, myocardial perfusion reserve (MPR) was estimated using Fermi-constrained deconvolution. RESULTS: Of 126 coronary vessels, 52 underwent pressure wire assessment. Of these, 27 lesions had an FFR <0.75. Sensitivity and specificity of visual CMR analysis to detect stenoses at a threshold of FFR <0.75 were 0.82 and 0.94 (p < 0.0001), respectively, with an area under the receiver-operator characteristic curve of 0.92 (p < 0.0001). From quantitative analysis, the optimum MPR to detect such lesions was 1.58, with a sensitivity of 0.80, specificity of 0.89 (p < 0.0001), and area under the curve of 0.89 (p < 0.0001). CONCLUSIONS: High-resolution CMR MPR at 3.0-T can be used to detect flow-limiting CAD as defined by FFR, using both visual and quantitative analyses.