Registration of 3D CT angiography and cardiac MR images in coronary artery disease patients.

A method for the registration of 3D cardiac CT angiography (CTA) and magnetic resonance (MR) data sets based on their myocardial epicardial surfaces is introduced. The approach relies on temporally registered data sets obtained based on the electrocardiogram recorded during the CTA acquisition and the timing characteristics of the MR acquisition. The myocardial epicardial surfaces were identified in the reformatted CTA and MR data sets using a 3D semi-automated segmentation algorithm. This algorithm was implemented, evaluated on clinical data, and compared to a set of manual outlines during the course of this study. The registration of the CTA and MR data sets was based on the iterative closest point algorithm, which minimizes the distance between the surfaces defined by the epicardial outlines in each data set. The proposed technique was applied to data obtained from 11 patients with coronary artery disease. The CTA data was reformatted based on the registration results and the location of the MR imaging planes. The resulting CTA-MR image pairs were evaluated qualitatively by two experts, who graded the majority of the cases as either excellent or acceptable (11 of 11 cases for one reader, and 9 of 11 for the other). The results were evaluated quantitatively based on the distance between the registered epicardial surfaces. The quantitative measures indicated that the registered surfaces were within two pixels of one another (on average). The registration results were used to generate combined 3D renderings of information extracted from both data sets for visualization purposes.