Impact of magnetic resonance imaging on cardiac mortality in thalassemia major.

PURPOSE

To evaluate whether the introduction of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in the management of thalassemia major (TM) patients has affected the risk of cardiac death.

MATERIALS AND METHODS

In all, 804 TM patients from two large reference units were included and the risk of dying of cardiac causes, before and after their first MRI, was assessed by a Cox proportional hazards model with time-dependent covariates.

RESULTS

Adding information from MRI reduced the risk of cardiac death from 6.0 deaths/1000 patient-years to 3.9 deaths/1000 patient-years (P = 0.22). The risk of cardiac death before having an MRI study was 82% higher compared to the risk observed after the first MRI.

CONCLUSION

MRI has become a vital component of ongoing management and seems to have a beneficial effect on cardiac mortality in TM.