Siemens Healthcare announced yesterday that the new Prime edition of their ACUSON SC2000 cardiovascular ultrasound system received FDA approval. It's Siemens' first system that has true volume 3-D transesophageal echo (TEE) with 90 degree by 90 degree acquisition and full-volume color Doppler.
"When interventionalists or surgeons are trying to image the heart, they can capture all of the anatomy of the heart with that 90 by 90 field of view," Saurabh Datta, product manager for ACUSON SC2000 Prime at Siemens, told DOTmed News.
According to Datta, other transducers on the market can get that field of view, however, there is a steep trade off between that and volume rate. "You can either understand when you get one snapshot of anatomy or you get dynamics of a small part of the anatomy. You don't get the complete picture."
Datta believes that the most significant thing about the system is that it allows the surgeon to see anatomy and blood flow together in real-time. This enables them to make sure that the repaired or replaced valve is working properly, which may prevent a secondary intervention to fix a dysfunctional valve.
Currently, surgeons have to perform image stitching to get information on the patient's blood flow. In order to do so, the surgeon has to stop the respirator connected to the patient for as much as six to eight seconds. This means patients with electrocardiogram abnormalities cannot undergo that procedure.
"It works fine when the patient is in complete synchrony with a normal heartbeat, but as soon as the patient has arrhythmia, which is the vast majority of the patients who are undergoing cardiac surgery, this technique does not work," said Datta.
The Prime edition also includes a new semi-automated software package called eSie Valves that measures heart valve size during cardiac procedures. Without that software, it takes the surgeons about 15 to 20 minutes to measure the valve, which is not practical in the OR.
According to Datta, eSie Valves makes the process simple. "If they need to measure something, they just press the button and the model generates it in a few seconds. That's the leap forward."
