Toward Fluoro-Free Interventions: Using Radial Intracardiac Ultrasound for Vascular Navigation

Hareem Nisar; Leah Groves; Leandro Cardarelli-Leite; Terry M Peters; Elvis C S Chen

doi:10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2022.02.025

Toward Fluoro-Free Interventions: Using Radial Intracardiac Ultrasound for Vascular Navigation

Ultrasound Med Biol. 2022 Jul;48(7):1290-1298. doi: 10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2022.02.025. Epub 2022 Apr 27.

Authors

Hareem Nisar¹, Leah Groves², Leandro Cardarelli-Leite³, Terry M Peters⁴, Elvis C S Chen⁵

Affiliations

¹ Robarts Research Institute, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada; Department of Biomedical Engineering, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada. Electronic address: hnisar3@uwo.ca.
² Robarts Research Institute, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada; Department of Biomedical Engineering, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada.
³ London Health Sciences Centre, London, Ontario, Canada.
⁴ Robarts Research Institute, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada; Department of Biomedical Engineering, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada; Department of Medical Biophysics, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada.
⁵ Robarts Research Institute, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada; Department of Biomedical Engineering, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada; Department of Medical Biophysics, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada; Lawson Health Research Institute, London, Ontario, Canada.

PMID: 35487839
DOI: 10.1016/j.ultrasmedbio.2022.02.025

Abstract

Transcatheter cardiovascular interventions have the advantage of patient safety, reduced surgery time and minimal trauma to the patient's body. Transcathether interventions, which are performed percutaneously, are limited by the lack of direct line of sight with the procedural tools and the patient anatomy. Therefore, such interventional procedures rely heavily on image guidance for navigating toward and delivering therapy at the target site. Vascular navigation via the inferior vena cava, from the groin to the heart, is an imperative part of most transcatheter cardiovascular interventions including heart valve repair surgeries and ablation therapy. Traditionally, the inferior vena cava is navigated using fluoroscopic techniques such as venography and computed tomography venography. These X-ray-based techniques can have detrimental effects on the patient as well as the surgical team, causing increased radiation exposure, leading to risk of cancer, fetal defects and eye cataracts. The use of a heavy lead apron has also been reported to cause back pain and spine issues, thus leading to interventionalist's disc disease. We propose the use of a catheter-based ultrasound augmented with electromagnetic tracking technology to generate a vascular roadmap in real time and perform navigation without harmful radiation. In this pilot study, we used spatially tracked intracardiac echocardiography to reconstruct a vessel from a phantom in a 3-D virtual environment. We illustrate how the proposed ultrasound-based navigation will appear in a virtual environment, by navigating a tracked guidewire within the vessels in the phantom without any radiation-based imaging. The geometric accuracy is assessed using a computed tomography scan of the phantom, with a Dice coefficient of 0.79. The average distance between the surfaces of the two models comes out to be 1.7 ± 1.12 mm.

Keywords: Fluoro-free; Transcatheter interventions; Transfemoral guidance; Vascular disease; Vascular navigation.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

Equipment Design
Heart*
Humans
Phantoms, Imaging
Pilot Projects
Surgery, Computer-Assisted*
Ultrasonography

Grants and funding

CIHR/Canada