Mitral Valve Area Assessment: Comparison With Transthoracic Echocardiography and Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Mitral Valve Area Assessment: Comparison With Transthoracic Echocardiography and Magnetic Resonance Imaging
To compare mitral valve area in rheumatic mitral valve stenosis with cardiac magnetic
 resonance imaging and conventional transthoracic echocardiography.
Clinical assessment of severity of mitral stenosis depends on both the presence of symptoms
 and mitral valve area . Evaluation of mitral valve area with transthoracic echocardiography
 maintains rapid, accurate analysis of valve disease and serves as a practical gold standard
 for clinical evaluation. Cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (CMRI) is a recently used method
 that allows to evaluate cardiac structures and function noninvasively. Direct visualization
 of valve area with CMRI is also possible and it has been shown that the valve area assessed
 by CMRI planimetry correlates reliably with the invasive assessment. Velocity-encoded cardiac
 magnetic resonance imaging can be used to quantify mitral valve area. The objective of this
 study was to evaluate mitral valve area with CMRI and compare it with echocardiographic
 methods including 2D planimetry, Doppler continuation equation and Doppler pressure half-time
Inclusion Criteria:

 -  rheumatic mitral valve stenosis

 Exclusion Criteria:

 -  Degenerative mitral valve disease

 -  EF<50%

 -  atrial fibrillation

 -  inconclusive planimetric assessment

 -  moderate or severe mitral regurgitation

 -  moderate or severe aortic regurgitation

 -  history of previous mitral valve commissurotomy or balloon valvotomy