The ischaemic and scar burden measured by cardiac magnetic resonance imaging in patients with ischaemic coronary heart disease from the CE-MARC study

Abstract

Background The prognostic importance of the ischaemic and scar burden, and their impact on coronary heart disease (CHD) patient management is well established from single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) studies. Recently, cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) has been shown to have superior sensitivity for the detection of CHD compared with SPECT [1]. However, the ischaemic and the scar burden measured by CMR and SPECT have not been compared. Methods From the prospective CE-MARC study, all patients who had significant coronary artery stenosis (≥70% of a first order coronary artery or ≥50% of the left main artery) on quantitative invasive coronary angiography and ischaemia on both CMR and SPECT were selected. The summed stress score (SSS), the summed rest score (SRS) as well as the summed difference score (SDS) were assessed based on a 5-point scoring scale (0=normal; 4=severe) for perfusion defects and/or late gadolinium enhancement (LGE)