Novel MRI technique enables non-invasive measurement of atrial wall thickness
File(s)
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Knowledge of atrial wall thickness (AWT) has the potential to provide important information for patient stratification and the planning of interventions in atrial arrhythmias. To date, information about AWT has only been acquired in post-mortem or poor-contrast computed tomography (CT) studies, providing limited coverage and highly variable estimates of AWT. We present a novel contrast agent-free MRI sequence for imaging AWT and use it to create personalized AWT maps and a biatrial atlas. A novel black-blood phase-sensitive inversion recovery protocol was used to image ten volunteers and, as proof of concept, two atrial fibrillation patients. Both atria were manually segmented to create subject-specific AWT maps using an average of nearest neighbors approach. These were then registered non-linearly to generate an AWT atlas. AWT was 2.4 ± 0.7 and 2.7 ± 0.7 mm in the left and right atria, respectively, in good agreement with post-mortem and CT data, where available. AWT was 2.6 ± 0.7 mm in the left atrium of a patient without structural heart disease, similar to that of volunteers. In a patient with structural heart disease, the AWT was increased to 3.1 ± 1.3 mm. We successfully designed an MRI protocol to non-invasively measure AWT and create the first whole-atria AWT atlas. The atlas can be used as a reference to study alterations in thickness caused by atrial pathology. The protocol can be used to acquire personalized AWT maps in a clinical setting and assist in the treatment of atrial arrhythmias.
Date Issued
2017-08
Date Acceptance
2017-02-12
Citation
IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging, 2017, 36 (8), pp.1607-1614
ISSN
0278-0062
Publisher
Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Start Page
1607
End Page
1614
Journal / Book Title
IEEE Transactions on Medical Imaging
Volume
36
Issue
8
Copyright Statement
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License. For more information, see http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
License URL
Identifier
https://www.webofscience.com/api/gateway?GWVersion=2&SrcApp=PARTNER_APP&SrcAuth=LinksAMR&KeyUT=WOS:000407344800001&DestLinkType=FullRecord&DestApp=ALL_WOS&UsrCustomerID=a2bf6146997ec60c407a63945d4e92bb
Subjects
ANATOMY
atrial atlas
atrial fibrillation
atrial imaging
Atrial wall thickness
black-blood MRI
catheter ablation
CATHETER ABLATION PROCEDURES
COMPUTED-TOMOGRAPHY
Computer Science
Computer Science, Interdisciplinary Applications
Engineering
Engineering, Biomedical
Engineering, Electrical & Electronic
ESOPHAGUS
FIBRILLATION
Imaging Science & Photographic Technology
Life Sciences & Biomedicine
POPULATION
PULMONARY VEINS
RADIOFREQUENCY ABLATION
Radiology, Nuclear Medicine & Medical Imaging
RELEVANCE
Science & Technology
SIMULATION
Technology
Publication Status
Published
Date Publish Online
2017-04-13