Planimetric quantification of mitral and tricuspid regurgitations by cine magnetic resonance imaging with gradient echo

Cine MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) in gradient echo is able to visualize directly rapid and turbulent flows such as regurgitations. A group of 55 patients with 40 mitral regurgitations (MR) and 26 tricuspid regurgitations (TR) was explored with a 0.28 T resistive magnet. Doppler echography and contrast angiography constitute the reference explorations. Qualitative examination of the dynamic images provides a diagnostic sensitivity for MRI of 100% versus angiography and of 88% versus echography. The three techniques are compared by four-step grading of the regurgitation severity with correlation coefficients always greater than 0.70. A more precise quantification is reached by planimetry of the signal loss jets; the most accurate quantification parameter is the mean absolute surface area of the auricular signal loss during the systole, which leads to a correlation coefficient of 0.84 ( p<10^-5) for MR and of 0.79 (p<10^-4) for TR