Prognostic significance of midwall fibrosis in dilated cardiomyopathy

Methods Consecutive patients with DCM referred for CMR between 2002-2008 were prospectively enrolled. The diagnosis of DCM was made using clinical, CMR and coronary angiographic findings. Patients with ischemic heart disease, primary valvar disease and infiltrative CM were excluded. LGE-CMR at 1.5T (Siemens Sonata or Avanto, Germany) was performed in 2 phase-encoding directions. The presence of midwall LGE was determined by a specialist blinded to all outcome data. The primary endpoint was all-cause mortality. The secondary endpoint was a composite of cardiovascular (CV) mortality or cardiac transplantation.