Reproducibility of short axis slice locations in longitudinal cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) studies

Background Longitudinal dynamic changes of myocardial ischemic injury determine left ventricular (LV) remodelling. Using conventional clinical cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR) imaging, the registration of short axis (SA) images for comparison of imaging findings at different time points is aided by the application of the same protocol to consistently identify the atrio-ventricular (AV) groove and SA planes. We hypothesise that, discrepancies in the selection of short and long axis planes lead to significant differences in location and angle between SA slices manually identified as corresponding in two studies of the same patient.