Role of Multimodality Imaging in the Diagnosis and Treatment of Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy

Abstract

Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM), or the presence of unexplained left ventricular (LV) hypertrophy, has a diverse phenotypic expression, making diagnosis often challenging. By using a variety of cardiac noninvasive imaging modalities, our diagnostic capabilities have been amplified. Imaging plays a key role in the diagnosis of disease, characterization of phenotype, classification of disease severity, risk stratification, family screening, and selection of appropriate therapy. This is achieved through assessment of cardiac structure and function as well as the presence of myocardial ischemia, fibrosis and metabolism, the presence of dynamic obstruction, mitral valve abnormalities, and the severity of mitral regurgitation. This review focuses on the variety of imaging modalities, with special attention to cardiac computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance (MR) in detection, characterization, and risk stratification of this phenotypically diverse disease.