Cardiac wall tracking using Doppler tissue imaging (DTI)

Doppler Tissue Imaging (DTI) is a new technique that provides an image information on values of intramy-ocardial wall velocity. This speciic capability makes easier the automatic myocardial boundary extraction and tracking task. We apply a variation on active contour models to an M-Mode Ultrasound image. This is in fact an image made from a time sequence of digitized 1D images. To the feature energy term derived from the grey scale conventional ultrasound image, is added a velocity term that makes the time displacement in the image close to the DTI data velocity. This permits data fusion of the two images obtained from conventional and DTI techniques. We illustrate the eeciency of the method that is now used by clinicians.