Effect of Transmural Extent of the Simulated Infarction in a Left Ventricular Model on Displacement and Strain Distribution Estimated from Synthetic Ultrasonic Data

The identification of a sub-endocardial infarction is of major interest in cardiology. This study evaluates the sensitivity of selected measures to the thickness of such an infarction. Synthetic ultrasonic data (long-axis view) of left ventricular models with inclusions were generated using Field II and meshes obtained from finite-element simulations, which also provided the reference for the estimates obtained from ultrasonic data. The displacements, the first and second component of the principal strain (ε₁ and ε₂), and several measures derived from these quantities were estimated. All estimates, except for the poorly estimated ε₂, exhibited sensitivity to the presence and transmurality of the inclusion. The most sensitive was the gradient of the averaged transmural profiles of ε₁, and ε₁ averaged over the area corresponding to the transmural inclusion. The inflection point of the ε₁ profile shifted toward the outer wall with increasing thickness of the non-transmural inclusion.