Healthy Adult Left and Right Ventricular Torsion and Torsion Rates With MR-Feature Tracking.

Area of Science:

• Cardiovascular imaging
• Cardiac mechanics
• Biomedical engineering

Background:

• Myocardial torsion quantification is increasingly recognized for its clinical value in cardiovascular disease prognosis and risk stratification.
• Normal values for left and right ventricular (LV and RV) torsion and torsion rates (TRs) are not fully established.
• The correlation of biventricular torsion and TRs with age and gender requires further investigation.

Purpose of the Study:

• To establish normal ranges for biventricular torsion, peak systolic, and diastolic TRs in healthy adults using magnetic resonance feature tracking (MR-FT).
• To investigate the relationship between these parameters and age and gender in a large cohort.

Main Methods:

• Retrospective analysis of 566 healthy adults (312 males, 254 females) using 1.5T/gradient echo MRI.
• Quantification of biventricular torsion and peak systolic and diastolic TRs via MR-FT.
• Statistical analysis including Shapiro-Wilk, t-tests, Mann-Whitney-U, linear regression, and Bland-Altman analysis.

Main Results:

• Women exhibited greater magnitudes of LV torsion, peak systolic TR, peak diastolic TR, and RV torsion compared to men.
• The magnitudes of LV and RV torsion, peak systolic, and diastolic TRs increased linearly with age in both genders.
• Measurements demonstrated good to excellent intraobserver and interobserver reproducibility (ICC > 0.70).

Conclusions:

• This study provides systematic, age- and sex-stratified reference values for LV and RV torsion and TRs using MR-FT.
• Higher magnitudes of biventricular torsion and TRs are associated with female sex and increasing age.
• These findings contribute to a better understanding of normal cardiac mechanics and potential reference ranges for clinical applications.