Assessment of cardiovascular physiology using dobutamine stress cardiovascular magnetic resonance reveals impaired contractile reserve in patients with cirrhotic cardiomyopathy

• Type: Article in International Scientific Journal
• Date: 2015

Authors

Pimenta J (Author) FMUP

Journal

The Journal is awaiting validation by the Administrative Services.

Title: JOURNAL OF CARDIOVASCULAR MAGNETIC RESONANCE

Vol. 17

ISSN: 1097-6647

Indexing

ISI Web of Knowledge - 17 Citations

Scopus - 0 Citations

Other information

Authenticus ID: P-00G-DX1

DOI: 10.1186/s12968-015-0157-6

Abstract (EN): Background: Liver cirrhosis has been shown to affect cardiac performance. However cardiac dysfunction may only be revealed under stress conditions. The value of non-invasive stress tests in diagnosing cirrhotic cardiomyopathy is unclear. We sought to investigate the response to pharmacological stimulation with dobutamine in patients with cirrhosis using cardiovascular magnetic resonance. Methods: Thirty-six patients and eight controls were scanned using a 1.5 T scanner (Siemens Symphony TIM; Siemens, Erlangen, Germany). Conventional volumetric and feature tracking analysis using dedicated software (CMR42; Circle Cardiovascular Imaging Inc, Calgary, Canada and Diogenes MRI; Tomtec; Germany, respectively) were performed at rest and during low to intermediate dose dobutamine stress. Results: Whilst volumetry based parameters were similar between patients and controls at rest, patients had a smaller increase in cardiac output during stress (p = 0.015). Ejection fraction increase was impaired in patients during 10 mu g/kg/min dobutamine as compared to controls (6.9 % vs. 16.5 %, p = 0.007), but not with 20 mu g/kg/min (12.1 % vs. 17.6 %, p = 0.12). This was paralleled by an impaired improvement in circumferential strain with low dose (median increase of 14.4 % vs. 30.9 %, p = 0.03), but not with intermediate dose dobutamine (median increase of 29.4 % vs. 33.9 %, p = 0.54). There was an impaired longitudinal strain increase in patients as compared to controls during low (median increase of 6.6 % vs 28.6 %, p < 0.001) and intermediate dose dobutamine (median increase of 2.6% vs, 12.6 % p = 0.016). Radial strain response to dobutamine was similar in patients and controls (p > 0.05). Conclusion: Cirrhotic cardiomyopathy is characterized by an impaired cardiac pharmacological response that can be detected with magnetic resonance myocardial stress testing. Deformation analysis parameters may be more sensitive in identifying abnormalities in inotropic response to stress than conventional methods.

Language: English

Type (Professor's evaluation): Scientific

No. of pages: 11