MRI-Guided Cardiac RF Ablation for Comparing MRI Characteristics of Acute Lesions and Associated Electrophysiologic Voltage Reductions.

Objective: Radiofrequency (RF) energy delivered to cardiac tissue produces a core ablation lesion with surrounding edema, the latter of which has been implicated in acute procedural failure of Ventricular Tachycardia (VT) ablation and late arrhythmia recurrence. This study sought to investigate the electrophysiological characteristics of acute RF lesions in the left ventricle (LV) visualized with native-contrast Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI).

Methods: An MR-guided electrophysiology system was used to deliver RF ablation in the LV of 8 swine (9 RF lesions in total), then perform MRI and electroanatomic mapping.