An echocardiography, echocardiogram, cardiac echo or simply an echo, is an ultrasound of the heart. It is a type of medical imaging of the heart, using standard ultrasound or Doppler ultrasound.
Angiography or arteriography is a medical imaging technique used to visualize the inside, or lumen, of blood vessels and organs of the body, with particular interest in the arteries, veins, and the heart chambers. Modern angiography is performed by injecting a radio-opaque contrast agent into the blood vessel and imaging using X-ray based techniques such as fluoroscopy.
Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is an imaging technique that uses low-coherence light to capture micrometer-resolution, two- and three-dimensional images from within optical scattering media. It is used for medical imaging and industrial nondestructive testing (NDT). Optical coherence tomography is based on low-coherence interferometry, typically employing near-infrared light. The use of relatively long wavelength light allows it to penetrate into the scattering medium. Confocal microscopy, another optical technique, typically penetrates less deeply into the sample but with higher resolution.
Coronary thrombosis is defined as the formation of a blood clot inside a blood vessel of the heart. This blood clot may then restrict blood flow within the heart, leading to heart tissue damage, or a myocardial infarction, also known as a heart attack.
An atheroma, or atheromatous plaque, is an abnormal and reversible accumulation of material in the inner layer of an arterial wall.
Intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) or intravascular echocardiography is a medical imaging methodology using a specially designed catheter with a miniaturized ultrasound probe attached to the distal end of the catheter. The proximal end of the catheter is attached to computerized ultrasound equipment. It allows the application of ultrasound technology, such as piezoelectric transducer or CMUT, to see from inside blood vessels out through the surrounding blood column, visualizing the endothelium of blood vessels.
Vasa vasorum are small blood vessels that comprise a vascular network supplying the walls of large blood vessels, such as elastic arteries and large veins.
Central retinal artery occlusion (CRAO) is a disease of the eye where the flow of blood through the central retinal artery is blocked (occluded). There are several different causes of this occlusion; the most common is carotid artery atherosclerosis.
Intima–media thickness (IMT), also called intimal medial thickness, is a measurement of the thickness of tunica intima and tunica media, the innermost two layers of the wall of an artery. The measurement is usually made by external ultrasound and occasionally by internal, invasive ultrasound catheters. Measurements of the total wall thickness of blood vessels can also be done using other imaging modalities.
Atherectomy is a minimally invasive technique for removing atherosclerosis from blood vessels within the body. It is an alternative to angioplasty for the treatment of peripheral artery disease, but the studies that exist are not adequate to determine whether it is superior to angioplasty. It has also been used to treat coronary artery disease, albeit without evidence of superiority to angioplasty.
Spontaneous coronary artery dissection (SCAD) is an uncommon but dangerous condition in which one of the arteries that supply the heart spontaneously develops a blood collection, or hematoma, within the artery wall. This leads to a separation and weakening of the walls of the artery.
Carotid ultrasonography is an ultrasound-based diagnostic imaging technique to evaluate structural details of the carotid arteries. Carotid ultrasound is used to diagnose carotid artery stenosis (CAS) and can assess atherosclerotic plaque morphology and characteristics. Carotid duplex and contrast-enhanced ultrasound are two of the most common imaging techniques used to evaluate carotid artery disease.
Coronary CT angiography is the use of computed tomography (CT) angiography to assess the coronary arteries of the heart. The patient receives an intravenous injection of radiocontrast and then the heart is scanned using a high speed CT scanner, allowing physicians to assess the extent of occlusion in the coronary arteries, usually in order to diagnose coronary artery disease.
Cardiac imaging refers to non-invasive imaging of the heart using ultrasound, magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), computed tomography (CT), or nuclear medicine (NM) imaging with PET or SPECT. These cardiac techniques are otherwise referred to as echocardiography, Cardiac MRI, Cardiac CT, Cardiac PET and Cardiac SPECT including myocardial perfusion imaging.
Giovanni J. Ughi, engineer and scientist, is one of the inventors of multimodality Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) and Laser-induced fluorescence molecular imaging, pioneering a first-in-man study of coronary arteries during his work at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School. The results of his work, combining two imaging technologies, may better identify dangerous coronary plaques, responsible for coronary artery disease and myocardial infarction. He also was one of the pioneers of targeted molecular imaging of human atherosclerosis, determining the use of molecular agents to illuminate high-risk features of human atherosclerotic plaques, arterial inflammation and plaque progression, and for the identification of unhealed stents at higher risk of stent thrombosis.
Guillermo J. Tearney is a professor of pathology at Harvard Medical School, a physicist in the department of dermatology at the Massachusetts General Hospital, a pathologist in the department of pathology at the Massachusetts General Hospital and runs a research laboratory at the Wellman Center for Photomedicine at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston Massachusetts. Tearney received his BA in applied mathematics, graduating cum laude (1988), his MD graduating magna cum laude (1998) from Harvard Medical School, and received his PhD in electrical engineering (1997) from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a well-known name in the field of biomedical optics, gastroenterology, and interventional cardiology for his prominent role on the development of endoscopic optical coherence tomography, in particular intracoronary optical coherence tomography, its translation to the clinic and commercialization. He is recognized as one of the inventors of Intracoronary optical coherence tomography. He is also recognized as co-inventor of optical coherence tomography for endoscopic imaging and diagnosis of esophagus disorders, a clinical technology currently commercialized by NinePoint Medical.
Intracoronary optical coherence tomography (OCT) is an endoscopic-based application of optical coherence tomography. Analogous to intravascular ultrasound, intracoronary OCT uses a catheter to deliver and collect near infrared light to create cross-sectional images of the artery lumen and wall. Intracoronary OCT creates images at a resolution of approximately 15 micro-meters, an order of magnitude improved resolution with respect to intravascular ultrasound and X-ray coronary angiogram.
Intravascular fluorescence is a catheter-based molecular imaging technique that uses near-infrared fluorescence to detect artery wall autofluorescence (NIRAF) or fluorescence generated by molecular agents injected intravenously (NIRF). No commercial systems based on intravascular fluorescence are currently on the market, however, significant steps forwards in intravascular fluorescence imaging technology have been made between 2010-2016. It is typically used to detect functional state of artery wall including some known high-risk features of atherosclerosis. It is usually combined with structural imaging modalities such as Intravascular ultrasound and/or Intracoronary optical coherence tomography, to provide functional information in a morphological context.
Optical coherence elastography (OCE) is an emerging imaging technique used in biomedical imaging to form pictures of biological tissue in micron and submicron level and maps the biomechanical property of tissue.
Optical coherence tomography angiography (OCTA) is a non-invasive imaging technique based on optical coherence tomography (OCT) developed to visualize vascular networks in the human retina, choroid, skin and various animal models. OCTA may make use of speckle variance optical coherence tomography.
