MR-IMAGING OF REGIONAL CARDIAC-FUNCTION - LOW-PASS FILTERING OF WALL THICKNESS CURVES

Wall thickness curves (WTCs) derived from MR images are subject to considerable measurement error, This study determines the effects of low-pass Fourier filtering of WTCs on functional parameters derived from the curve: peak rate of wall thinning (PRWT) and time to PRWT (TPRWT), The intersubject standard deviation (SD) of PRWT changed from 0.35 to 0.18, and the SD of TPRWT from 34.3 to 29.5. Differences between neighboring segments decreased from 0.31 to 0.15% mean thickness/ms for PRWT (P = 0.012), and from 35.0 to 19.0 ms for TPRWT (P = 0.005), It is concluded that filtering of MR imaging-derived WTCs contributes to a better representation of myocardial wall motion.