Emerging role of multimodality imaging in management of inflammatory pericardial diseases

The non-specific and highly variable symptomatology of inflammatory pericardial diseases create clinical challenges in making accurate diagnosis, which often requires the integration of clinical findings, imaging and invasive hemodynamic assessment. Echocardiography is considered to be a first-line imaging test in pericardial diseases. Emerging imaging modalities, especially cardiac MRI allowed better understanding of pericardial anatomy, physiology and, for the first time, enable demonstration of the pericardial inflammation. On the other hand, cardiac computed tomography is excellent tool to define pericardial thickness, pericardial calcification and is useful for preoperative planning once pericardiectomy is indicated especially in the patients with prior cardiac surgery.