COMPARISON BETWEEN MANUAL AND SEMIAUTOMATED ANALYSIS OF LEFT-VENTRICULAR VOLUME PARAMETERS FROM SHORT-AXIS MR-IMAGES

Purpose: The goal of this study was to evaluate a newly developed semi automated contour detection algorithm for the quantitative analysis of cardiovascular MRI. Method: Left ventricular function parameters deri ved from automatically detected endocardial and epicardial contours we re compared with results derived from manually traced contours in shor t-axis multislice GRE MRI studies of 10 normal volunteers and 10 infar ct patients. Results: Compared with manual image analysis, the semiaut omated method resulted in the following systematic and random differen ces (auto - manual; mean +/- SD): end-diastolic volume: -5.5 +/- 9.7 m l; end-systolic volume: -3.6+/-6.5 ml; ejection fraction: 1.7 +/- 4.1% ; left ventricular mass: 7.3 +/- 20.6 g. Total analysis time for a com plete study was reduced from 3-4 h for the manual analysis to <20 min using semiautomated contour detection. Conclusion: Global left ventric ular function parameters can be obtained with a high degree of accurac y and precision using the present semiautomated contour detection algo rithm.