Reproducibility study on myocardial strain assessment using fast-SENC cardiac magnetic resonance imaging

• Published in: Scientific reports Vol. 8; no. 1; pp. 14100 - 9
• Main Authors: Giusca, Sorin, Korosoglou, Grigorios, Zieschang, Victoria, Stoiber, Lukas, Schnackenburg, Bernhard, Stehning, Christian, Gebker, Rolf, Pieske, Burkert, Schuster, Andreas, Backhaus, Sören, Pieske-Kraigher, Elisabeth, Patel, Amit, Kawaji, Keigo, Steen, Henning, Lapinskas, Tomas, Kelle, Sebastian
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 20.09.2018; Nature Publishing Group
• Subjects: 59/57; 692/4019/592/75/230; 692/700/139/422; Adult; Aged; Aged, 80 and over; Correlation coefficient; Female; Heart - diagnostic imaging; Heart diseases; Heart failure; Heart Failure - diagnostic imaging; Heart Failure - physiopathology; Heart Ventricles - diagnostic imaging; Heart Ventricles - physiopathology; Humanities and Social Sciences; Humans; Magnetic resonance imaging; Magnetic Resonance Imaging, Cine - methods; Male; Middle Aged; multidisciplinary; Myocardium; NMR; Nuclear magnetic resonance; Reproducibility; Reproducibility of Results; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Ventricle; Ventricular Dysfunction, Left - diagnostic imaging; Ventricular Dysfunction, Left - physiopathology; Young Adult; Global Longitudinal Strain (GLS); Left Ventricular (LV); Myocardial Strain; Circumferential Strain; Left Ventricular Ejection Fraction (LVEF)
• ISSN: 2045-2322; 2045-2322
• DOI: 10.1038/s41598-018-32226-3

Myocardial strain is a well validated parameter for estimating left ventricular (LV) performance. The aim of our study was to evaluate the inter-study as well as intra- and interobserver reproducibility of fast-SENC derived myocardial strain. Eighteen subjects (11 healthy individuals and 7 patients with heart failure) underwent a cardiac MRI examination including fast-SENC acquisition for evaluating left ventricular global longitudinal (GLS) and circumferential strain (GCS) as well as left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF). The examination was repeated after 63 [range 49‒87] days and analyzed by two experienced observers. Ten datasets were repeatedly assessed after 1 month by the same observer to test intraobserver variability. The reproducibility was measured using the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) and Bland-Altman analysis. Patients with heart failure demonstrated reduced GLS and GCS compared to healthy controls (−15.7 ± 3.7 vs. −20.1 ± 1.4; p = 0.002 for GLS and −15.3 ± 3.7 vs. −21.4 ± 1.1; p = 0.001 for GCS). The test-retest analysis showed excellent ICC for LVEF (0.92), GLS (0.94) and GCS (0.95). GLS exhibited excellent ICC (0.99) in both intra- and interobserver variability analysis with very narrow limits of agreement (−0.6 to 0.5 for intraobserver and −1.3 to 0.96 for interobserver agreement). Similarly, GCS showed excellent ICC (0.99) in both variability analyses with narrow limits of agreement (−1.1 to 1.2 for intraobserver and −1.7 to 1.3 for interobserver agreement), whereas LVEF showed larger limits of agreement (−14.4 to 10.1). The analysis of fast-SENC derived myocardial strain using cardiac MRI provides a highly reproducible method for assessing LV functional performance.