Cardiac MRI One Year after COVID-19 Vaccination Valuable in Detecting Heart Damage

Sustained Myocarditis Concerning in Young Persons

By Peter A. McCullough, MD, MPH

I recently had a young male patient with the clinical diagnosis of COVID-19 mRNA COVID-19 vaccine myocarditis in 2021 develop recurring symptoms in 2025. His cardiac MRI demonstrated late gadolinium enhancement indicative of either ongoing inflammation cardiac scar.

Warren et al studied 67 young Australian victims of COVID-19 vaccine myopericarditis hospitalizations after taking the shot.

Warren J, Cheng D, Crawford N, Jones B, Ng RL, Alafaci A, Stub D, Lew P, Taylor AJ. Improved diagnosis of COVID-19 vaccine-associated myocarditis with cardiac scarring identified by cardiac magnetic resonance imaging. Open Heart. 2025 Jul 18;12(2):e003333. doi: 10.1136/openhrt-2025-003333. PMID: 40681307; PMCID: PMC12278148.

67 patients with C-VAM (mean age 30±13 years, 72% male) underwent CMR evaluation. The median time from vaccination to CMR was 548 (range 398-603) days. 20 patients (30%) had LGE. At diagnosis, nine patients (13%) were classified as definite and 58 (87%) as probable myocarditis. With the integration of CMR-LGE data, 16 patients (28%) were reclassified from probable to definite myocarditis. LGE on CMR occurred in one-third of patients with C-VAM.