高橋 正明¹, 篠山 重威², 小坂田 元太¹, 中村 正治², 山元 明子², 神奈木 俊子², 河合 忠一², 浅田 尚紀³, 英保 茂³, 桑原 道義³

Masaaki TAKAHASHI¹, Sigetake SASAYAMA², Genta OSAKADA¹, Masaharu NAKAMURA², Akiko YAMAMOTO², Toshiko KANNAGI², Chuichi KAWAI², Naoki ASADA³, Shigeru EIHO³, Michiyoshi KUWAHARA³

¹京都大学医学部附属病院検査部, ²京都大学医学部第三内科, ³京都大学工学部オートメーション研究施設

¹Central Clinical Laboratory, Kyoto University Hospital, ²The Third Division, Department of Internal Medicine, Kyoto University Hospital, ³Automation Research Laboratory, Kyoto University

キーワード : regional left ventricular function, two-dimensional echocardiography, three dimensional display, automatic image processing, left ventricle

Automatic image processing system of two-dimensional echocardiograms has been developed for analysis of regional left ventricular function. Echocardiogram of the apical long-axis view, which was directly recorded on video tape, was transferred to a minicomputer through an analog-digital converter. Endocardial margin was automatically traced along the peak points of the echo signals. Each image was superimposed and 128 radial grids were drawn from the center of gravity of end-diastolic left ventricle to the endocardial margin and the length of each grid line was measured, which provided quantitative description of the regional wall motion over the entire circumference.
We have also developed a method of reconstructing left ventricle in the three dimensions from six long-axis views obtained by rotating the probe at 30° intervals in the apical region. After superimposing the images, the centripetal motion from the endocardial surface to the center of spatial gravity of end-diastolic left ventricle, which was expressed as percent shortening was evaluated. This two- and three-dimensional image processing system provide quantitative evaluation of regional left ventricular function and estimation of extent of myocardial injury.