[The role of cardiac magnetic resonance imaging in defining the prognosis of patients with acute ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction. Part 2. Assessment of the disease prognosis].

Currently the incidence of congestive heart failure after ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) tends to increase. Reperfusion therapy is still the only effective method to reduce an infarct size. Therefore, there is a high unmet need of novel cardioprotective treatments that would improve outcomes in such patients. Recent advances in cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) methods enabled the identification of certain new infarct characteristics associated with the development of heart failure and sudden cardiac death. These characteristics can help identify new groups of high risk patients and used as a targets for novel cardioprotective treatments. This part of the review summarizes novel CMR-based characteristics of myocardial infarction and their role in the prognostic stratification of STEMI patients.

Correlations between clinical and laboratory findings and prognostically unfavorable CMR-based characteristics of acute ST-elevation myocardial infarction.

Aim To evaluate factors associated with unfavorable predictive characteristics of ST-segment elevation acute myocardial infarction (STEMI) as per data of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI).Material and methods The study included 52 patients with STEMI who underwent a primary percutaneous coronary intervention (pPCI). Contrast-enhanced cardiac MRI was performed for all patients on days 3-7. Delayed contrast-enhancement images were used for assessing infarct size, presence of microvascular obstruction (MVO) areas, and heterogeneity zones.Results Multifactorial analysis showed that independent predictors of MVO were type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM) (relative risk (RR) 1.9, confidence interval (CI): 1.1-3.26, р=0.012), increased levels of brain natriuretic peptide (BNP) (RR 2.04, CI: 1.39-2.99, р=0.004) and creatine kinase (CK) (RR 2.06, CI: 0.52-0.80, р=0.02), and infarct size (IS) (RR 2.81; CI: 1.38-5.72, р=0.0004). Construction of ROC curves provided the quantitative values of study indexes, at which the risk of MVO increased. For BNP, this value was ≥276 pg/ml (sensitivity, 95.7 %; specificity, 37.9 %); for CK ≥160 U/l (sensitivity, 74.1 %; specificity, 61.9 %); and for IS ≥18.8 % (sensitivity, 79.3 %; specificity, 69.6 %). Correlation analysis of risk factors for increased size of the heterogeneity zone showed significant correlations of the heterogeneity zone size with older age of patients (r=0.544, р<0.0001), higher concentrations of BNP (r=0.612, р<0.0001), CK (r=0.3, 95 % CI: 0.02-0.5, р=0.03), and C-reactive protein (CRP) (r=0.59, CI: 0.3-0.7, р=0.0001). Increased levels of CK (r=0.53, 95 % CI: 0.29-0.70, р=0.0001) and BNP (r=0.55, 95 % CI: 0.28-0.70, p=0.0003) significantly correlated with increased IS.Conclusion Risk of MVO formation as per MRI data increased in the presence of type 2 DM and IS ≥18.8 % (р<0.05). Formation of MVO in patients with STEMI was associated with increased levels of BNP ≥276 pg/ml and CK ≥160 U/l (р<0.05). Increased levels of BNP, CK, and CRP were associated with a larger size of heterogeneity zone according to data of the correlation analysis. A larger heterogeneity zone was more typical for older patients. Increased levels of CK and BNP were also associated with larger IS. The correlation analysis did not show any significant interactions between the size of heterogeneity zone, IS, and MVO size (р>0.05).

[The role of cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (cardiovascular magnetic resonance) in defining the prognosis of patients with acute ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction. Part 1. Indications and contraindications to cardiovascular magnetic resonance].

Recently, the role of cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (cardiovascular magnetic resonance) in the diagnosis of coronary artery disease and acute myocardial infarction has increased significantly. This method is defined as the gold standard for differentiation between ischemic vs non-ischemic and acute vs chronic myocardial injury. This part of the review summarizes the main methods of cardiovascular magnetic resonance, its safety, indications and contraindications.

[Therapeutic Hypothermia in a Cardiac Arrest: Complicated Questions and Unsolved Problems].

The article aims to review the main trials, meta-analyses and guidelines regarding to various practical aspects and unsolved questions of an appliance of the therapeutic hypothermia in out-of-hospital and in-hospital cardiac arrest.