2010 Articles

In vitro characterization of cardiac radiofrequency ablation lesions using optical coherence tomography

Fleming, Christine P.; Quan, Kara J.; Wang, Hui; Amit, Guy; Rollins, Andrew M.

Currently, cardiac radiofrequency ablation (RFA) is guided by indirect signals. We demonstrate optical coherence tomography (OCT) characterization of RFA lesions within swine ventricular wedges. Untreated tissue exhibited a consistent birefringence artifact within OCT images due to the organized myocardium, which was not present in treated tissue. Birefringence artifacts were detected by filtering with a Laplacian of Gaussian (LoG) to quantify gradient strength. The gradient strength distinguished RFA lesions from untreated sites (p=5.93×10-15) with a sensitivity and specificity of 94.5% and 86.7% respectively. This study demonstrates the potential of OCT for monitoring cardiac RFA, confirming lesion formation and providing feedback to avoid complications.