A synchronized phonocardiogram for shear wave elastography

Abstract

Worldwide, cardiovascular diseases (e.g. coronary heart disease and stroke) are the leading cause of death. Early detection of cardiac failure symptoms and effective treatment can help reducing health care costs and predict cardiovascular events, which may prevent loss of quality of life, or even loss of life. This early recognition of imminent heart failure is done by evaluating certain risk factors. It is the general assumption that the myocardial stiffness is correlated to diastolic disfunction. During the heart cycle, shear waves are generated by the different moving substances inside the heart, like flowing blood and moving muscle tissue. The propagation velocity of shear waves depends on the tissue stiffness. Thus, by examining shear waves an indication of the myocardial stiffness can be obtained. Currently, no comparable accurate non-invasive method for obtaining an early indication of imminent heart failure is available on the market. In this project, classic phonocardiogram recordings recorded with a custom cost-efficient synchronized recorder system are combined with high frame rate images from the Zonare ZS3 ultrasound imaging machine. It is shown that synchronization with the ZS3 is achieved and a video using ultrasound images and phonocardiogram is composed. This ultimately helps in learning how changing shear wave parameters correlate to imminent heart failure.

This research is a collaboration of the TU Delft and EMC Rotterdam.