2D Coordinate System of the Heart

With the increasing rate of myocardial infarction (MI) in men and women, it is important to develop a diagnosis tool to determine the effect of MI on the mechanics of the heart and to minimize the effect of heart muscle damage on overall cardiac performance. After a myocardial infarct, the left ventricle of the heart enlarges to compensate for a weak heart muscle. The enlarged and weakened heart gives rise to the clinical syndrome of heart failure. In order to maximize the mechanical performance of the weakened heart, regional ventricular loading and contraction must be understood. To isolate regional wall mechanics, a floating centroid for the left ventricle must to be calculated. This is easy in the normal heart where the left ventricle approximates a single radius of curvature; however in heart failure there are irregular shape changes that complicate this calculation. This book is mainly focused on the problems related to finding the centroid of the heart in the short axis view of the left ventricle using echocardiographic images. It proposes a solution i.e. a new approach for finding the centroid of the heart.