A Tensor-Based Catheter and Wire Detection and Tracking Framework and Its Clinical Applications.

Yingliang Ma,Kawal S Rhode,Lei Ye,Diwei Zhou,Ansab Fazili,R James Housden

doi:10.1109/tbme.2021.3102670

Abstract

Catheters and wires are used extensively in cardiac catheterization procedures. Detecting their positions in fluoroscopic X-ray images is important for several clinical applications such as motion compensation and co-registration between 2D and 3D imaging modalities. Detecting the complete length of a catheter or wire object as well as electrode positions on the catheter or wire is a challenging task. In this paper, an automatic detection framework for catheters and wires is developed. It is based on path reconstruction from image tensors, which are eigen direction vectors generated from a multiscale vessel enhancement filter. A catheter or a wire object is detected as the smooth path along those eigen direction vectors. Furthermore, a real-time tracking method based on a template generated from the detection method was developed. The proposed framework was tested on a total of 7,754 X-ray images. Detection errors for catheters and guidewires are 0.56 ± 0.28 mm and 0.68 ± 0.33 mm, respectively. The proposed framework was also tested and validated in two clinical applications. For motion compensation using catheter tracking, the 2D target registration errors (TRE) of 1.8 mm ± 0.9 mm was achieved. For co-registration between 2D X-ray images and 3D models from MRI images, a TRE of 2.3 ± 0.9 mm was achieved. A novel and fully automatic detection framework and its clinical applications are developed. The proposed framework can be applied to improve the accuracy of image-guidance systems for cardiac catheterization procedures.

Highlights

M inimally-invasive cardiac interventional procedures such as the treatment of heart failure, structural heart disease and cardiac electrophysiology (EP) procedures are usually guided using X-ray fluoroscopy
Using the position of a catheter or a wire object which is inserted into the narrow blood vessels of the heart will help compensate the motions of the heart as the catheter or wire moves together with the heart
This paper presents a robust real-time catheter and guidewire tracking framework and its novel clinical applications

Summary

Introduction

M inimally-invasive cardiac interventional procedures such as the treatment of heart failure, structural heart disease and cardiac electrophysiology (EP) procedures are usually guided using X-ray fluoroscopy. To aid navigation and overcome the lack of soft tissue contrast, threedimensional (3D) roadmaps can be overlaid onto X-ray images to add anatomical information. Detecting the position of catheters or wires in X-ray images is important for several clinical applications. Using the position of a catheter or a wire object which is inserted into the narrow blood vessels (e.g. coronary sinus) of the heart will help compensate the motions of the heart as the catheter or wire moves together with the heart. For co-registration between a 2D X-ray image and 3D roadmap, an automatic registration method could be developed if the position of a catheter or a wire object inside the narrow blood vessel is detected. The automatic method will use the centerline of the detected object to align with the centerline of the narrow blood vessel models in the roadmaps. Detecting the locations of wires or catheters can automatically narrow down the region of interest

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