Quantitative Echocardiography, Part 2: Automatic Boundary Detection for On-line Assessment of Left Ventricular and Atrial Function

Two-dimensional echocardiography is widely used for assessment of cardiac chamber size and function. A new method for real-time quantitative assessment of left ventricular systolic function using automatic boundary detection (ABD) has been developed based on principles of quantitative ultrasound backscatter imaging of the myocardium. The clinical accuracy of ABD for measurement of cardiac chamber areas and volumes has been validated against conventional two-dimensional echocardiography, transesophageal echocardiography, radionuclide ventriculography, and left ventriculography. Left ventricular diastolic function can also be evaluated by ABD, and the results complement those obtained indirectly by pulsed Doppler echocardiographic recordings of the diastolic mitral flow velocity. Recently, ABD has also been used to evaluate left atrial chamber dimensions and atrial function. Thus, real-time ABD is a new echocardiographic method for quantitative assessment of cardiac function that obviates the need for off-line analysis of video images.