The browser you are using is not supported by this website. All versions of Internet Explorer are no longer supported, either by us or Microsoft (read more here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/windows/end-of-ie-support).

Please use a modern browser to fully experience our website, such as the newest versions of Edge, Chrome, Firefox or Safari etc.

Cardiac MR Group

Hjärt-MR-gruppen

 

 

The Cardiac MR Group (LUCRIS link) performs research, teaching and clinical diagnostics at the Center for Medical Imaging and Physiology, Department of Clinical Physiology at Lund University and Skåne University Hospital, Lund.

Under the leadership of Professor Håkan Arheden MD, PhD [Publications] and senior researchers Professor Anthony Aletras [Publications], Assoc Prof Marcus Carlsson [Publications], Assoc Prof Einar Heiberg [Publications], Assoc Prof Henrik Engblom [Publications], Assoc Prof Erik Hedström [Publications], Ellen Ostenfeld MD, PhD [Publications], Jonas Jögi MD, PhD [Publications] and Assoc Prof Katarina Steding-Ehrenborg [Publications], the group works together with cardiologists, thoracic surgeons, clinical physiogists, radiologists, physicists, mathematicians and programmers.

 

Portrait of Professor Hakan Arheden
Professor Håkan Arheden

Lund University Hospital is the largest center in Scandinavia for cardiac MRI in patients. The Cardiac MR Group at the Department of Clinical Physiology consists of physicians, engineers, technicians and a physiotherapist. The multidisciplinary composition of the group is essential when performing research in the field of cardiac MRI.

 

 

The senior engineer, Associate Professor Einar Heiberg, has developed a widely used software for image analysis which is continuously adapted for the research needs of the group. The Cardiac MR group closely collaborates with researchers in the MR physics group and researchers at the department of cardiology (group Erlinge, group Magnusson), experimental vascular research (group Gomez), pediatric cardiology, obstetrics (group Hansson), internal medicine and rheumathology. The Cardiac MR group collaborates with researchers at Duke University, Durham, UCSF, San Francisco, Washington University, St. Louis, University of Thessaly, University of Glasgow, and University of Oslo. 

Magnetic resonance image of the heart in a so called three-chamber view.
MR image shows the pumping of the heart

 

 

For more than 10 years, a central theme for the research pursued by the Cardiac MR group has been the pathophysiological mechanisms associated with acute myocardial infarction, including quantitative assessments of infarct size, myocardium at risk and, consequently, myocardial salvage. One of the seminal articles generated from this work was awarded the prize “Editor´s pick of 2009” in JCMR. The validation of quantitative perfusion with CMR with PET was awarded “Editor´s pick of 2017” in JCMR.

The work on cardiac pumping using cardiac MRI was awarded the Crafoord prize for best thesis at Faculty of Medicine, Lund University 2007. Our research also includes patients with congenital heart disease, athletes and patients with heart failure including pulmonary hypertension.

Visualization and image analysis is a core research focus within the Cardiac MR group with four PhD students and three post doctoral fellows working on four-dimensional flow, segmentation of cardic imaging and quantification of myocardial SPECT. This part of the group is supervised by Einar Heiberg.

The following two videos show one such novel visualization technique, in a healthy volunteer and in a patient with heart failure.

Volume Tracking of blood flow in the healthy heart

 

Volume Tracking of blood flow in a patient with heart failure

 

Selected publications

Arheden H, Saeed M, Higgins CB, et al. Measurement of the distribution volume of gadopentetate dimeglumine at echo-planar MR imaging to quantify myocardial infarction: comparison with 99mTc-DTPA autoradiography in rats. Radiology 1999;211:698-708. 

Carlsson M, Ugander M, Mosen H, Buhre T, Arheden H. Atrioventricular plane displacement is the major contributor to left ventricular pumping in healthy adults, athletes, and patients with dilated cardiomyopathy. Am J Physiol Heart Circ Physiol 2007;292:H1452-9. 

Heiberg E, Ugander M, Engblom H, et al. Automated quantification of myocardial infarction from MR images by accounting for partial volume effects: animal, phantom, and human study. Radiology 2008;246:581-8. 

Carlsson M, Ubachs JF, Hedstrom E, Heiberg E, Jovinge S, Arheden H. Myocardium at risk after acute infarction in humans on cardiac magnetic resonance: quantitative assessment during follow-up and validation with single-photon emission computed tomography. JACC Cardiovasc Imaging 2009;2:569-76. 

Engblom H, Hedström E, Heiberg E, Wagner GS, Pahlm O, Arheden H. Rapid initial reduction of hyperenhanced myocardium after reperfused first myocardial infarction suggests recovery of the peri-infarction zone: one-year follow-up by MRI. Circ Cardiovasc Imaging 2009;2:47-55. 

Hedström E, Engblom H, Frogner F, et al. Infarct evolution in man studied in patients with first-time coronary occlusion in comparison to different species - implications for assessment of myocardial salvage. J Cardiovasc Magn Reson 2009;11:38. 

Sörensson P, Heiberg E, Saleh N, et al. Assessment of myocardium at risk with contrast enhanced steady-state free precession cine cardiovascular magnetic resonance compared to single-photon emission computed tomography. J Cardiovasc Magn Reson 2010;12:25. 

Steding K, Engblom H, Buhre T, et al. Relation between cardiac dimensions and peak oxygen uptake. J Cardiovasc Magn Reson 2010;12:8. 

Carlsson M, Heiberg E, Toger J, Arheden H. Quantification of left and right ventricular kinetic energy using four-dimensional intracardiac magnetic resonance imaging flow measurements. Am J Physiol Heart Circ Physiol 2012;302:H893-900. 

Töger J, Kanski M, Carlsson M, et al. Vortex Ring Formation in the Left Ventricle of the Heart: Analysis by 4D Flow MRI and Lagrangian Coherent Structures. Ann Biomed Eng 2012. 

Arvidsson PM, Töger J, Heiberg E, Carlsson M, Arheden H. Quantification of left and right atrial kinetic energy using four-dimensional intracardiac magnetic resonance imaging flow measurements. J Appl Physiol 2013;114:1472-81. 

Atar D, Arheden H, Berdeaux A, et al. Effect of intravenous TRO40303 as an adjunct to primary percutaneous coronary intervention for acute ST-elevation myocardial infarction: MITOCARE study results. Eur Heart J 2014. 

Erlinge D, Gotberg M, Lang I, et al. Rapid Endovascular Catheter Core Cooling Combined With Cold Saline as an Adjunct to Percutaneous Coronary Intervention for the Treatment of Acute Myocardial Infarction: The CHILL-MI Trial: A Randomized Controlled Study of the Use of Central Venous Catheter Core Cooling Combined With Cold Saline as an Adjunct to Percutaneous Coronary Intervention for the Treatment of Acute Myocardial Infarction. J Am Coll Cardiol 2014;63:1857-65.