Myocardial Attenuation Quantification for Diagnosis of Ischemic Heart Disease

Abstract

The conventional ultrasonography demonstrates limited specificity for the diagnosis of ischemic heart disease (IHD) since the standard procedure relies on subjective decision criteria such as the thickness and the motion of the heart wall. Recent studies in IHD have demonstrated that necrosis of the myocardium leads to an increase in lipid fraction, resulting in decreased acoustic attenuation coefficient (AAC). In this paper, we propose a method of quantifying the degree of myocardial damage by using a quantitative heart imaging network (QHI-net). The proposed method enhances the accuracy of diagnosis and allows visual identification of the infarcted region.