Detailed analysis of myocardial motion in volunteers and patients using high-temporal-resolution MR tissue phase mapping

Purpose: To detect and investigate details in left ventricular (LV) motion patterns with a temporal resolution comparable to that of echocardiography. Material and Methods: To assess global and regional myocardial motion in high temporal detail, respiratory-gated MR phase-contrast measurements with three-directional velocity encoding (venc) were performed in 12 healthy volunteers and two patients with LV hypertrophy in basal, midventricular, and apical locations of the LV with a temporal resolution of 13.8 msec. Results: The volunteer data revealed details in LV motion patterns that were known only from echocardiography. For all volunteers, characteristic myocardial motion patterns, such as triphasic global diastolic expansion, could be detected with high accuracy. One volunteer underwent an additional echocardiographic measurement in order to corroborate the complex motion features as measured by MRI. Patient examinations revealed substantial changes in diastolic function compared to motion patterns in healthy volunteers. Conclusion: The proposed high-temporal-resolution velocity-mapping technique provides previously undetectable information on LV performance, and is highly promising for the detection of local and global motion abnormalities in patients with disturbed LV performance, such as diastolic dysfunction.