Method and system for monitoring cardiac function of a patient during a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) procedure

• US 8,583,209 B2
• Filed: 09/25/2008
• Issued: 11/12/2013
• Est. Priority Date: 10/03/2007
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Siemens Healthcare GMBH (Siemens AG)
• Original Assignee: Siemens AG
• Inventors: Maier, Corinna
• Primary Examiner(s): Le, Long V.
• Assistant Examiner(s): Negarestan, Farshad
• Application Number:
  US12/237,467
• Publication Number:
  US 20090093707A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,874 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 600/410
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0044 for the heart
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/055 involving electronic [EMR] or nuclear [NMR] magnetic resonance, e.g. magnetic resonance imaging
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/1075 for measuring dimensions by non-invasive methods, e.g. for determining thickness of tissue layer A61B8/0858 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7257 using Fourier transforms
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7267 involving training the classification device
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/743 Displaying an image simultaneously with additional graphical information, e.g. symbols, charts, function plots
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 50/70 for mining of medical data, e.g. analysing previous cases of other patients

Abstract

A method for monitoring cardiac function of a patient during a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) procedure, including: acquiring an MR image sequence of the patient'"'"'s heart during a cardiac phase; segmenting a left ventricle of the patient'"'"'s heart in the MR image sequence, wherein the segmentation produces endocardial and epicardial contours; representing at least one of the contours in polar or radial coordinates and computing its Fourier transform, wherein the Fourier transform produces Fourier descriptors for the contour; putting a vector of the Fourier descriptors into a classifier, wherein the classifier determines whether the contour reflects normal wall motion in the cardiac phase or whether the contour reflects abnormal wall motion in the cardiac phase; and alerting a medical practitioner when abnormal wall motion is detected.

Claims

1. A method for monitoring cardiac function of a patient during a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) procedure, comprising:

acquiring an MR image sequence of the patient'"'"'s heart during a cardiac phase;

segmenting a left ventricle of the patient'"'"'s heart in the MR image sequence, wherein the segmentation produces endocardial and epicardial contours;

representing at least one of the contours in polar or radial coordinates and computing its Fourier transform, wherein the Fourier transform produces Fourier descriptors for the contour;

putting a vector of the Fourier descriptors into a classifier, wherein the classifier determines whether the contour reflects normal wall motion in the cardiac phase or whether the contour reflects abnormal wall motion in the cardiac phase, wherein a contour rejected by the classifier using an unconditional, predictive probability of the contour'"'"'s observation vector as a confidence measure is interpreted as a pathological change in the left ventricle'"'"'s myocardial wall motion, wherein contours reflective of abnormal wall motion are surrounded by contours reflective of normal wall motion in polar coordinates; and

alerting a medical practitioner when abnormal wall motion is detected.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the classifier is trained.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the classifier is trained prior to start of the MRI procedure by observing normal wall motion during systole and diastole cardiac phases of the patient'"'"'s heart and setting a baseline threshold for the normal wall motion in each of these phases.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the training is supervised or unsupervised.

5. The method of claim 3, wherein the confidence measure is compared against the baseline threshold for the normal wall motion in the systole and diastole cardiac phases and if the confidence measure is below its respective baseline threshold the contour reflects abnormal wall motion.

6. The method of claim 1, further comprising:

displaying real-time images of the patient'"'"'s heart during the MRI procedure.

7. The method of claim 1, wherein the wall is a myocardial wall.

8. The method of claim 1, wherein the MRI procedure comprises an MRI-guided intervention or an MRI stress test.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein when the classifier determines that the contour reflects normal wall motion the contour is classified as systole or diastole, the method further comprising:

acquiring a next MR image sequence of the patient'"'"'s heart during a next cardiac phase;

segmenting the left ventricle of the patient'"'"'s heart in the next MR image sequence, wherein the segmentation produces next endocardial and epicardial contours;

representing at least one of the next contours in polar or radial coordinates and computing its Fourier transform, wherein the Fourier transform produces Fourier descriptors for the next contour;

putting a vector of the Fourier descriptors for the next contour into the classifier, wherein the classifier classifies the next contour as systole or diastole;

analyzing the contour classifications made by the classifier during the original and next cardiac phases; and

alerting the medical practitioner that abnormal wall motion has been detected when the contour classification is the same in both the original and next cardiac phases.

10. The method of claim 1, wherein only magnitude is used as the vector of the Fourier descriptors input to the classifier.

11. A system for monitoring cardiac function of a patient during a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) procedure, comprising:

a memory device for storing a program;

a processor in communication with the memory device, the processor operative with the program to;

acquire an MR image sequence of the patient'"'"'s heart during a cardiac phase;

segment a left ventricle of the patient'"'"'s heart in the MR image sequence, wherein the segmentation produces endocardial and epicardial contours;

represent at least one of the contours in polar or radial coordinates and compute its Fourier transform, wherein the Fourier transform produces Fourier descriptors for the contour;

put a vector of the Fourier descriptors into a classifier, wherein the classifier determines whether the contour reflects normal wall motion in the cardiac phase or whether the contour reflects abnormal wall motion in the cardiac phase by using a confidence measure; and

alert a medical practitioner when abnormal wall motion is detected,

wherein the confidence measure is defined by

12. The system of claim 11, wherein the classifier is trained.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the classifier is trained prior to start of the MRI procedure by observing normal wall motion during systole and diastole cardiac phases of the patient'"'"'s heart and setting a baseline threshold for the normal wall motion in each of these phases.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the training is supervised or unsupervised.

15. The system of claim 13, wherein the confidence measure is compared against the baseline threshold for the normal wall motion in the systole and diastole cardiac phases and if the confidence measure is below its respective baseline threshold the contour reflects abnormal wall motion.

16. The system of claim 11, wherein the processor is further operative with the program to:

display real-time images of the patient'"'"'s heart during the MRI procedure.

17. The system of claim 11, wherein the wall is a myocardial wall.

18. The system of claim 11, wherein the MRI procedure comprises an MRI-guided intervention or an MRI stress test.

19. A non-transitory computer readable medium tangibly embodying a program of instructions executable by a processor to perform method steps for monitoring cardiac function of a patient during a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) procedure, the method steps comprising:

acquiring an MR image sequence of the patient'"'"'s heart during a cardiac phase;

segmenting a left ventricle of the patient'"'"'s heart in the MR image sequence, wherein the segmentation produces endocardial and epicardial contours;

representing at least one of the contours in polar or radial coordinates and computing its Fourier transform, wherein the Fourier transform produces Fourier descriptors for the contour;

putting a vector of the Fourier descriptors into a classifier, wherein the classifier determines whether the contour reflects normal wall motion in the cardiac phase or whether the contour reflects abnormal wall motion in the cardiac phase by using a confidence measure; and

alerting a medical practitioner when abnormal wall motion is detected,

wherein the confidence measure is defined by

20. The computer readable medium of claim 19, wherein the classifier is trained.

21. The computer readable medium of claim 20, wherein the classifier is trained prior to start of the MRI procedure by observing normal wall motion during systole and diastole cardiac phases of the patient'"'"'s heart and setting a baseline threshold for the normal wall motion in each of these phases.

22. The computer readable medium of claim 21, wherein the training is supervised or unsupervised.

23. The computer readable medium of claim 21, wherein the confidence measure is compared against the baseline threshold for the normal wall motion in the systole and diastole cardiac phases and if the confidence measure is below its respective baseline threshold the contour reflects abnormal wall motion.

24. The computer readable medium of claim 19, the method steps further comprising:

displaying real-time images of the patient'"'"'s heart during the MRI procedure.

25. The computer readable medium of claim 19, wherein the wall is a myocardial wall.

26. The computer readable medium of claim 19, wherein the MRI procedure comprises an MRI-guided intervention or an MRI stress test.