Journal of cardiovascular magnetic resonance : official journal of the Society for Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance
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J Cardiovasc Magn Reson · Oct 2008
Routine clinical cardiovascular magnetic resonance in paediatric and adult congenital heart disease: patients, protocols, questions asked and contributions made.
Cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) of patients with congenital heart disease (CHD) has become routine clinical practice. However, existing CMR protocols focus predominantly on patients with ischemic heart disease, and information is limited on the types of patient with CHD who benefit from CMR investigation, and in what ways. Therefore the aim of this study was to answer the questions: What type of patients were studied by CMR in a centre specializing in paediatric and adult CHD management? What questions were asked, which protocols were used and were the questions successfully answered? To answer these questions, we conducted a cohort study of all 362 patients that received routine clinical CMR during 2007 at the Department of Paediatric Cardiology and Congenital Heart Disease at the Deutsches Herzzentrum München. ⋯ Contrary to common belief, routine CMR of patients with CHD was not requested to address global anatomical questions so much as to clarify specific questions of morphology and function of known anatomy. The CMR protocols used differed markedly from those widely used in patients with ischemic heart disease.