Systems and methods for assessing organ and/or tissue transplantation by simulating one or more transplant characteristics

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-10499990-B2
Application number	US-201615357008-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Nov 21, 2016
Priority date	Nov 23, 2015
Publication date	Dec 10, 2019
Grant date	Dec 10, 2019

Abstract

Systems and methods are disclosed for assessing organ and/or tissue transplantation by estimating blood flow through a virtual transplant model by receiving a patient-specific anatomical model of the intended transplant recipient; receiving a patient-specific anatomical model of the intended transplant donor, the model including the vasculature of the organ or tissue that is intended to be transplanted to the recipient; constructing a unified model of the connected system post transplantation, the connected system including the transplanted organ or tissue from the intended transplant donor and the vascular system of the intended transplant recipient; receiving one or more blood flow characteristics of the connected system; assessing the suitability for an actual organ or tissue transplantation using the received blood flow characteristics; and outputting the assessment into an electronic storage medium or display.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A computer implemented method for assessing organ or tissue transplantation by estimating blood flow through a virtual transplant model, the method comprising:
receiving a patient-specific anatomical model of an intended transplant recipient, the patient-specific anatomical model being generated from image data and the patient-specific anatomical model including a vasculature of the intended transplant recipient that is designated to supply blood to the transplanted organ or tissue;
receiving a donor-specific anatomical model of an intended transplant donor, the donor-specific anatomical model being generated from image data and the donor-specific anatomical model including a vasculature of the organ or tissue of the intended transplant donor that is designated to be transplanted to the intended transplant recipient;
constructing a unified geometric model of a connected system including at least some of the vasculature of the organ or tissue of the donor-specific anatomical model and at least some of the vasculature of the patient-specific anatomical model, where the vasculature of the patient-specific anatomical model is designated to supply blood to the transplanted organ or tissue;
estimating blood flow through the unified geometric model to compute a blood flow characteristic of the blood flow through the connected system;
evaluating the planned transplantation using the computed blood flow characteristic; and
outputting the evaluation into an electronic storage medium or display.

2. The computer implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising:
receiving, prior to constructing the unified geometric model, one or more blood flow characteristics of one or more of:
the vasculature of the intended transplant recipient designated to supply blood to the transplanted organ or tissue based on the patient-specific anatomical model, or
the vasculature of the organ or tissue of the intended transplant donor based on the donor-specific anatomical model; and

outputting the received one or more blood flow characteristics, prior to constructing the unified geometric model, to an electronic storage medium.

3. The computer implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the blood flow characteristic includes, one or more of:
a blood pressure at one or more points in the patient-specific anatomical model, the donor-specific anatomical model, or in the unified geometric model;
a fractional flow reserve values at one or more points in the patient-specific anatomical model, the donor-specific anatomical model, or in the unified geometric model;
a flow rate or flow velocity at one or more points in the patient-specific anatomical model, the donor-specific anatomical model, or in the unified geometric model;
a perfusion characteristic of an organ or tissue; and
a blood supply demand of an organ or tissue.

4. The computer implemented method of claim 1 , further comprising:
computing one or more functional characteristics of the transplanted organ or tissue of the connected system; and
evaluating the planned transplantation using the computed blood flow characteristic and functional characteristic(s).

5. The computer implemented method of claim 4 , wherein a functional characteristic includes a characteristic that is specific to a performance of a transplanted organ or tissue, including, one or more of:
a cardiac output for an intended heart transplant;
a glomerular filtration rate for an intended kidney transplantation;
a clearance capacity for an intended liver transplantation; and
a tissue perfusion characteristic for an intended tissue transplantation.

6. The computer implemented method of claim 2 , wherein receiving one or more blood flow characteristics includes:
determining a mass of an organ, tissue, and/or vasculature, and
using an allometric relationship to estimate a blood supply demand characteristic.

7. The computer implemented method of claim 2 , wherein receiving one or more blood flow characteristics includes:
performing a 3D or reduced order model fluid simulation on the patient-specific anatomical model or the donor-specific anatomical model, using a processor;
computing the blood flow characteristic at a point of the patient-specific anatomical model or at a point of the donor-specific anatomical model; and
outputting the computed blood flow characteristic prior to constructing the unified geometric model to an electronic storage medium.

8. The computer implemented method of claim 1 , wherein constructing a unified geometric model of the connected system includes determining a connection between the vasculature of the organ or tissue of the intended transplant donor and the vasculature of the intended transplant recipient designated to supply blood to the transplanted organ or tissue.

9. The computer implemented method of claim 1 , wherein, evaluating the planned transplantation using the computed blood flow characteristic includes, one or more of:
determining whether a blood flow characteristic at one or more points of the connected system meets a predetermined magnitude; and
determining whether a blood flow characteristic at one or more points of a connected system adversely affects the blood flow characteristic of an intact organ, tissue, and/or vasculature of the donor or recipient.

10. The computer implemented method of claim 1 , wherein, the patient-specific anatomical model and the donor-specific anatomical model are generated from image data.

11. The computer implemented method of claim 4 , wherein, evaluating the planned transplantation using the computed blood flow characteristic and functional characteristics includes determining indication of functioning of the transplanted organ or tissue in the connected system, based on the functional characteristics of the connected system.

12. The computer implemented method of claim 1 , wherein, evaluating the planned transplantation using the computed blood flow characteristic includes, one or more of:
determining the risk or existence of vessel insufficiency, and
determining the risk or existence of threatened or failing organs.

13. The computer implemented method of claim 1 , wherein, receiving a patient-specific anatomical model includes, one or more of,
receiving one or more medical images from, one or more of, a computerized tomography (CT), coronary computerized tomography (cCT), magnetic resonance (MR) imaging, ultrasound imaging, or angiography;
segmenting the one or more received medical images into one or more voxels;
identifying the voxels of interest for the derivation of a patient-specific anatomical model;
deriving a patient-specific anatomical model from the identified voxels; and
outputting the derived model into an in an electronic storage medium.

14. The computer implemented method of claim 1 , wherein the patient-specific anatomical model is a representation of any vascular system, subsystem, partial system, or anatomy, including, one or more of:
the cardiovascular system for an intended heart transplant;
the hepatic vasculature for an intended liver transplant;
the pulmonary vasculature for an intended lung transplant;
the internal thoracic artery, superior thyroid artery, and inferior thyroids for an intended thymus transplant;
the renal vasculature for an intended kidney transplant;
the visceral vasculature for an intended intestine transplant;
the pancreatic vasculature for an intended pancreas transplant; and
the vascular system supplying blood to a limb for an intended transplant of a limb.

15. A system for assessing organ or tissue transplantation by estimat

Assignees

• Heartflow Inc

Inventors

• Grady Leo
• Taylor Charles A
• Zarins Christopher

Classifications

• G06T7/11

  Region-based segmentation · CPC title

• G16H50/50 Primary

  for simulation or modelling of medical disorders · CPC title

• G06T2207/10088

  Magnetic resonance imaging [MRI] · CPC title

• A61B6/032

  Transmission computed tomography [CT] · CPC title

• A61B8/06

  Measuring blood flow · CPC title