coronary heart disease has been one of the main threats of human health. coronary angiography is taken as the “gold standard” for the assessment of coronary artery disease. but sometimes, the images are difficult to interpret visually because of the crossing and overlapping of the vessels in the angiograms. vessel extraction from x-ray angiograms has been a challenging problem for several years...

BACKGROUND Computerized tomographic angiography (3D data representing the coronary arteries) and X-ray angiography (2D X-ray image sequences providing information about coronary arteries and their stenosis) are standard and popular assessment tools utilized for medical diagnosis of coronary artery diseases. At present, the results of both modalities are individually analyzed by specialists and ...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE The objective of this study was to evaluate the relative value of high-resolution, contrast-enhanced MR angiography (CE MRA) with elliptical centric k-space ordering compared with intra-arterial x-ray angiography for imaging carotid stenosis. METHODS Thirty patients with suspected stenosis of the carotid arteries were examined with CE MRA (1.5-T scanner) and x-ray angio...

Analysis of Subtraction Methods in 3D Contrast-Enhanced MR Digital Subtraction Angiography Yuexi Huang Master of Science 2001 Department of Medical Biophysics University of Toronto 3D Contrast-enhanced MR angiography is promising as a replacement to catheter-based x-ray angiography due to its non-invasive nature. However, the image quality of MR angiography is still inferior to that of x-ray an...

Recent developments of novel magnetic resonance intravascular contrast agents with low T1 in blood and a long intravascular half-life will rapidly position magnetic resonance coronary angiography (MRCA) at the threshold of clinical application. This article describes the use of one such intravascular contrast agent for noninvasive coronary angiography and comparison with routine invasive x-ray ...

azygos vein aneurysm is a rare cause of a posterior or paratracheal mediastinal mass. trauma or conditions causing elevated flow or pressure in the azygos system, such as cardiac failure or cirrhosis of the liver are secondary causes of aneurysm of the azygos vein. we report a case of asymptomatic saccular aneurysm of the azygos vein in a 45-year-old man with blunt minor chest trauma. the azygos...

BACKGROUND Early coronary bypass graft failures may be preventable if identified intraoperatively. The purpose of this investigation was to compare the diagnostic accuracy of two intraoperative graft assessment techniques, transit-time ultrasound flow measurement and indocyanine green fluorescent-dye graft angiography. METHODS Patents undergoing isolated coronary artery bypass grafting with n...

BACKGROUND In patients with Kawasaki disease, serial evaluation of the distribution and size of coronary artery aneurysms (CAA) is necessary for risk stratification and therapeutic management. Although transthoracic echocardiography is often sufficient for this purpose initially, visualization of the coronary arteries becomes progressively more difficult as children grow. We sought to prospecti...