Advanced tissue characterization in non-ischemic cardiomyopathies using contrast-enhanced cardiac magnetic resonance imaging.

Cardio-vascular magnetic resonance imaging (CMR) can be used to obtain integrated information on both cardiac function and on advanced tissue characteristics. Using contrast-enhanced techniques, highly diagnostic information on tissue viability, inflammatory changes, and on storage diseases can be obtained within a 45-minute examination. The combination of functional information (using steady-state free precession sequences cine techniques), assessment of myocardial edema (using T2-based techniques), of reversible injury (for example in inflammatory diseases; using T1-based techniques), and irreversible injury (for example in infarction and regional fibrosis, using late gadolinium enhancement techniques) allows disease-specific and prognostic information to be obtained in patients with non-ischemic cardiomyopathy. Contrast-enhanced CMR allows the accurate diagnosis of non-ischemic cardiomyopathies, identification of primary and secondary cardiomyopathies, and can be used to guide therapy, thus avoiding the need for invasive measures such as endomyocardial biopsy in many cases.