K. Yuasa et al., QUANTIFICATION OF OCCLUSIVE AND REPERFUSED MYOCARDIAL INFARCT SIZE WITH GD-DTPA-ENHANCED MR-IMAGING, European journal of radiology, 17(3), 1993, pp. 150-154
The potential of Gd-DTPA-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) for
measuring infarct size was assessed in canine hearts. Twelve dogs und
erwent pre- and post-contrast MR imaging before and after recanalizati
on. Infarct area was identified by triphenyltetrazolium chloride (TTC)
staining of postmortal specimens in each case. Recanalization was com
plete in 10 dogs. High SI area was seen after reperfusion in nine of t
hem; and it showed low signal intensity before reperfusion in seven of
them. Two dogs were killed during reperfusion period: neither of them
showed a low SI area before reperfusion. Necrotic regions were confir
med by TTC staining in seven of 12 dogs. Both the visual and quantitat
ive assessment (n=7) indicated that the extent of the low SI area befo
re reperfusion was approximately the same as that of the necrotic regi
on shown by TTC staining, while the high SI area seen after reperfusio
n was obviously larger than both the necrotic region and the low SI ar
ea on pre-reperfusion images. The correlation coefficient between low
SI area and necrotic area was 0.98, and between high SI area and necro
tic area was 0.80. These results suggest that Gd-DTPA-enhanced MRI may
be useful for quantification of infarct size in occlusive myocardial
infarction but it may overestimate in reperfused one.