Pericardial disease
- DOI:
- 10.1093/med/9780199549573.003.11
Imaging the pericardium 294
Pericarditis 296
Pericardial effusion 298
Pericardial constriction 300
Pericardial cysts 302
Pericardial tumours 304
Congenital absence of the pericardium 306
The pericardium consists of a parietal and visceral layer, usually with a small amount of fluid in between (especially in the pericardial recesses, and in children and young adults). Variable amounts of fat may be present both on the surface of the heart (‘epicardial fat’) and on the pericardial surface (‘pericardial fat’). The thin pericardium is often not seen on CMR imaging, unless highlighted by surrounding fat, and the close proximity of fat, fluid, and fibrotic tissue within one voxel often causes a chemical shift artefact, resulting in complete absence of signal in these pixels. The pericardium may therefore appear as a thin black line....
Access to the complete content on Oxford Medicine Online requires a subscription or purchase. Public users are able to search the site and view the abstracts for each book and chapter without a subscription.
Please subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you have purchased a print title that contains an access token, please see the token for information about how to register your code.
For questions on access or troubleshooting, please check our FAQs, and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us.
