Radiomics and deep learning for myocardial scar screening in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.

Background: Myocardial scar burden quantified using late gadolinium enhancement (LGE) cardiovascular magnetic resonance (CMR), has important prognostic value in hypertrophic cardiomyopathy (HCM). However, nearly 50% of HCM patients have no scar but undergo repeated gadolinium-based CMR over their life span. We sought to develop an artificial intelligence (AI)-based screening model using radiomics and deep learning (DL) features extracted from balanced steady state free precession (bSSFP) cine sequences to identify HCM patients without scar.

Methods: We evaluated three AI-based screening models using bSSFP cine image features extracted by radiomics, DL, or combined DL-Radiomics. Images for 759 HCM patients (50 ± 16 years, 66% men) in a multi-center/vendor study were used to develop and test model performance. An external dataset of 100 HCM patients (53 ± 14 years, 70% men) was used to assess model generalizability. Model performance was evaluated using area-under-receiver-operating curve (AUC).

Results: The DL-Radiomics model demonstrated higher AUC compared to DL and Radiomics in the internal (0.83 vs 0.77, p = 0.006 and 0.78, p = 0.05; n = 159) and external (0.74 vs 0.64, p = 0.006 and 0.71, p = 0.27; n = 100) datasets. The DL-Radiomics model correctly identified 43% and 28% of patients without scar in the internal and external datasets compared to 42% and 16% by Radiomics model and 42% and 23% by DL model, respectively.

Conclusions: A DL-Radiomics AI model using bSSFP cine images outperforms DL or Radiomics models alone as a scar screening tool prior to gadolinium administration. Despite its potential, the clinical utility of the model remains limited and further investigation is needed to improve the accuracy and generalizability.