Automatic prediction of myocardial contractility improvement in stress MRI using shape morphometrics with independent component analysis.

An important assessment in patients with ischemic heart disease is whether myocardial contractility may improve after treatment. The prediction of myocardial contractility improvement is generally performed under physical or pharmalogical stress conditions. In this paper, we present a technique to build a statistical model of healthy myocardial contraction using independent component analysis. The model is used to detect regions with abnormal contraction in patients both during rest and stress.