Two-dimensional speckle tracking echocardiography: standardization efforts based on synthetic ultrasound data.
OBJECTIVE
Speckle tracking echocardiography has already demonstrated its clinical potential. However, its use in routine practice is jeopardized by recent reports on high inter-vendor variability of the measurements. As such, the European Association of CardioVascular Imaging (EACVI) and the American Society of Echocardiography (ASE) set up a standardization task force, which was joined by all manufacturers of echocardiographic equipment as well as by companies offering software solutions only, with the ambition to tackle this problem by standardization and quality assurance (QA).


RESULTS
In this study, a first step towards QA of all commercially available tracking solutions based on computer-generated ultrasound images is presented. The accuracy of the products was acceptable with relative errors below 10% and intra-vendor reproducibility within 5%.


CONCLUSIONS
Whether these results can be extrapolated to the clinical setting is the topic of an ongoing study of the EACVI/ASE/Industry Task Force to standardize deformation imaging. This study was an important first step in the development of generally accepted tools for QA of speckle tracking echocardiography.
Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, University of Leuven, Herestraat 49, Leuven 3000, Belgium jan.dhooge@uzleuven.be.
Jan
J
D'hooge
Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, University of Leuven, Herestraat 49, Leuven 3000, Belgium.
Daniel
D
Barbosa
Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, University of Leuven, Herestraat 49, Leuven 3000, Belgium.
Hang
H
Gao
Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, University of Leuven, Herestraat 49, Leuven 3000, Belgium.
Piet
P
Claus
Philips Medical Systems, Andover, MA, USA.
David
D
Prater
Epsilon Imaging, Ann Arbor, MI, USA.
Jamie
J
Hamilton
GE Healthcare, Tel Aviv, Israel.
Peter
P
Lysyansky
Toshiba Medical Systems Corporation, Otawara-shi, Tochigi, Japan.
Yasuhiko
Y
Abe
Hitachi-Aloka Medical, Tokyo, Japan.
Yasuhiro
Y
Ito
Siemens Ultrasound, Mountain View, CA, USA.
Helene
H
Houle
Esaote, Genoa, Italy.
Stefano
S
Pedri
TomTec Imaging Systems, Unterschleissheim, Germany.
Rolf
R
Baumann
Bluhm Cardiovascular Institute, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, USA.
James
J
Thomas
University of Padova, Padova, Italy.
Luigi P
LP
Badano
D026683:Advisory Committees; D057791:Cardiac Imaging Techniques / Q000592:standards; D003198:Computer Simulation; D004452:Echocardiography / Q000592:standards*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D008297:Male; D011786:Quality Control; D012955:Societies, Medical; D012984:Software; D018608:Ultrasonography, Doppler / Q000592:standards*; D014481:United States
cardiac function; speckle tracking echocardiography; standardization; variability