4D MR Pressure Difference Mapping: Comparison with Echocardiography and Invasive Catheter Measurements

Jelena Bock¹, Julia Geiger¹, Raoul Arnold², Daniel Hirtler¹, Hans Burkhardt¹, Michael Markl³

Pressure gradients are an important clinical marker for the severity of cardiovascular disease such as aortic valve stenosis or aortic coarctation. It was the aim of this study to evaluate the potential of an optimized data analysis strategy based on 4D flow MRI for the assessment of aortic 3D pressure difference maps compared to the gold standard invasive catheter measurements in patients with aortic coarctation. Differences between MRI, echocardiography and catheter measurements demonstrate the potential of MRI to non-invasively determine pressure gradients in aortic coarctation and indicate the importance of dynamic aortic boundary conditions for accurate pressure difference estimation.