Wendy Beattie attends VSI University 2 day training session
Published: 29 April 2024
The training session was on standardization of pre-clinical cardiovascular imaging
I recently attended the VSI University 2-day training session on standardization of pre-clinical cardiovascular imaging. The course was held at the FUJIFILM VisualSonics European office in Amsterdam, and focused on mouse cardiovascular imaging and data analysis, using the VEVO F2 imaging system and VevoLAB™ analysis software. The course was designed to ensure all aspects of cardiovascular imaging were mastered, and the group size was kept small to ensure we all had many chances to get ‘hand’s on’ to hone our skills.
The lab-based aspect of the course covered basic cardiac views (parasternal long axis, short axis, apical four chambers view) and assessment of the systolic and diastolic parameters in M-Mode and Pulsed Wave Doppler. We also worked on 4D imaging of the mouse heart and 4D colour Doppler. We then moved onto vascular imaging, looking at the aortic arch and carotid artery in B-Mode, ECG-gated Kilohertz Visualisation (EKV), colour Doppler, and Pulsed Wave Doppler Mode. Finally, we learned about Pulsed Wave Velocity measurement in the mouse aortic arch.
At the end of each day we moved on to offline data analysis training using VevoLAB™ - this is VisualSonics data analysis software, and has many useful features to make downstream analysis easier (including AutoLV, which has the potential to remove all the hassle of annotating images, as well as reducing user bias). VevoLAB™ also allows for the assessment of systolic and diastolic parameters, 4D analysis, Vevo Vasc™ (vascular strain analysis), Vevo Strain™ (cardiac strain analysis) and Pulsed Wave Velocity analysis.
I would like to say a huge thank you to the school for funding this trip – I certainly feel more confident in my imaging abilities, and I hope I am able to share what I’ve learned and contribute to more research projects. It was also an excellent opportunity to meet the VisualSonics team – they truly are experts in their field, and so keen to share that knowledge. They are also very friendly, so please do contact them if you have any queries or comments regarding their systems and software. And if anyone would like to discuss the potential of enriching your studies with cardiovascular imaging, please feel free to contact me (email address: wendy.beattie@glasgow.ac.uk).
VisualSonics: https://www.visualsonics.com
First published: 29 April 2024