Low-dose gadobenate dimeglumine versus standard-dose gadopentate dimeglumine for delayed contrast-enhanced cardiac magnetic resonance imaging

RATIONALE AND OBJECTIVES: The purpose of our study was to compare gadopentate dimeglumine (Gd-DTPA) and gadobenate dimeglumine (Gd-BOPTA) for the evaluation of myocardial infarction (MI) and in the grading transmural extent on late-contrast enhanced cardiac magnetic resonance imaging. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Twenty-three patients with clinically proven MI were examined with the use of 0.2 mmol/kg Gd-DTPA and 0.1 mmol/kg Gd-BOPTA in 2 days interval. All patients were examined with the use of segmented two-dimensional inversion-recovery turbo fast-field echo pulse sequence with an inversion time 210-300 milliseconds. Fifteen minutes time delay was used on both examinations after the injection of contrast agent. Contrast-to-noise ratio between normal myocardium and infarcted myocardium and signal intensity ratio (SIR) of the enhanced myocardium to blood pool was derived and compared for each contrast agent. RESULTS: A total of 61 infarcted segments were analyzed. All of the infarcted segments were visualized on both Gd-BOPTA and Gd-DTPA enhanced images. There was statistically no significant difference between 0.2 mmol/kg Gd-DTPA and 0.1 mmol/kg Gd-BOPTA in the mean contrast-to-noise ratio (10.19 versus 10.22; P = .96), SNR (14.29 versus 14.25; P = .96), and SIR (4.34 versus 4.21; P = .38) of the infarcted segments. Intraobserver agreement (kappa) between Gd-DTPA and Gd-BOPTA were R1 = 91% and R2 = 86%. Interobserver agreements between the readers were Gd-DTPA = 85% and Gd-BOPTA = 88%. CONCLUSION: According to our data, the diagnostic efficacy of 0.1 mmol/kg dose Gd-BOPTA is equivalent to that of 0.2 mmol/kg Gd-DTPA for the assessment of MI on delayed enhanced magnetic resonance images.