Cardiac Image Registration

Long procedure time and somewhat suboptimal results hinder the widespread use of catheter ablation of complex arrhythmias such as atrial fibrillation (AF). Due to lack of contrast differentiation between the area of interest and surrounding structures in a moving organ like heart, there is a lack of proper intraprocedural guidance using current imaging techniques for ablation. Cardiac image registration is currently under investigation and is in clinical use for AF ablation. Cardiac image registration, which involves integration of two images in the context of left atrium (LA), is intermodal, with the acquired image and the real-time reference image residing in different image spaces, and involves optimization, where one image space is transformed into the other. Unlike rigid body registration, cardiac image registration is unique and challenging due to cardiac motion during the cardiac cycle and due to respiration. This review addresses the basic principles of the emerging technique of registration and the inherent limitations as they relate to cardiac imaging and registration.