Scoring of late gadolinium enhancement in cardiac magnetic resonance imaging can predict cardiac events in patients with hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.

BACKGROUND

Late gadolinium enhancement (LGE) of cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) represents myocardial fibrosis and may be related to the clinical outcome of various heart diseases. This study evaluated the relationship between LGE and cardiac events in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM) using a new scoring method.

METHODS AND RESULTS

This study retrospectively followed 46 HCM patients without heart failure symptoms for 3.8 ± 1.8 years. Gadolinium-enhanced cardiac MRI was performed in all patients. Cardiac events including newly developed heart failure or ventricular tachyarrhythmia were evaluated during the follow-up period. We evaluated the predictive factors to identify the patients with cardiac events. None of the risk factors reported to be related to poor outcome or the existence of LGE alone could predict cardiac events, which might be due to the small number of subjects investigated in this study. A new scoring method for LGE-positive areas (LGE score) was applied and higher LGE score can predict cardiac events in this study population.

CONCLUSIONS

The proposed LGE score for cardiac MRI is considered to be a potentially valid method for assessing cardiac events in HCM patients.