Quantitative assessment of the infarct transmurality using delayed contrast enhanced magnetic resonance images: description and validation

The extent and degree of myocardial injury after an ischemic event are strong predictors of patient´s outcome. After acute infarction, delayed contrast enhancement magnetic resonance imaging allows clinicians to distinguish between viable and non-viable myocardium and can delineate with high precision the infarcted tissue. The aim of this study is to provide a quantitative method based on the fuzzy c-means clustering algorithm to assess the location and the extent of the infarcted area. Segmental infarct trasmurality was visually assessed on a 5-point scale for the 288 segments. The agreement between visual and quantitative analyses was good: 84% of the segments were categorized similarly by quantitative and visual analyses