Articles
Articles are a collaborative effort to provide a single canonical page on all topics relevant to the practice of radiology. As such, articles are written and continuously improved upon by countless contributing members. Our dedicated editors oversee each edit for accuracy and style. Find out more about articles.
803 results found
Article
Cervical aortic arch
Cervical aortic arches are a rare aortic arch anomaly characterized by an elongated, high-lying aortic arch extending at or above the level of the medial ends of the clavicles.
Clinical presentation
Patients with cervical aortic arch are usually asymptomatic. Symptomatic patients may present w...
Article
Pulmonary valve regurgitation
Pulmonary valve regurgitation, also known as pulmonary valve insufficiency or pulmonary valve incompetence, is a valvulopathy that describes leaking of the pulmonary valve diastole that causes blood to flow in the reverse direction from the pulmonary trunk and into the right ventricle.
Epidemio...
Article
Right-to-left shunt (mnemonic)
A useful mnemonic to remember the differential diagnoses associated with right-to-left cardiovascular shunts is:
1-5
Mnemonic
1: a combination vessel; truncus arteriosus
2: number of arteries involved; transposition of the great arteries
3: "tri-" means 3, the number of leaflets involved; t...
Article
Surgical hemostatic material
Surgical hemostatic material is used to control bleeding intraoperatively and is hence frequently intentionally left in the operative bed, not to be confused with a gossypiboma which is caused by foreign material left behind in error. Its use has increased with the advent of minimally invasive s...
Article
Right heart strain
Right heart strain (or more precisely right ventricular strain) is a term given to denote the presence of right ventricular dysfunction usually in the absence of an underlying cardiomyopathy. It can manifest as an acute right heart syndrome.
Pathology
Right heart strain can often occur as a re...
Article
Cardiovascular shunts
Cardiovascular (cardiac) shunts are abnormal connections between the pulmonary and systemic circulations. Most commonly they are the result of congenital heart disease.
Pathology
Blood can either be shunted from the systemic circulation to pulmonary circulation (i.e. 'left-to-right shunt') or ...
Article
Left atrial appendage
The left atrial appendage, also known as left auricle, is a pouch-like projection from the main body of the left atrium, which lies in the atrioventricular sulcus in close proximity to the left circumflex artery, the left phrenic nerve, and the left pulmonary veins.
Gross anatomy
Morphological...
Article
Left dominant arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathy
Left dominant arrhythmogenic cardiomyopathy is a variant of arrhythmogenic right ventricular cardiomyopathy that predominantly affects the left ventricle of the heart. It may also be known as arrhythmogenic left ventricular cardiomyopathy 4.
Clinical presentation
The main clinical diagnostic f...
Article
Septal bounce
Septal bounce is a sign of ventricular interdependence on echocardiography, cardiac CT, and cardiac MRI, manifested by paradoxical interventricular septal movement during early diastole (i.e. initial septal movement towards and then away from the left ventricle) seen mainly in constrictive peric...
Article
Hibernating myocardium
Hibernating myocardium is myocardial tissue that has reduced contractility due to poor perfusion but remains viable. In ischemic heart disease, evaluating myocardial viability is important because hibernating myocardium can recover function after revascularization.
Pathology
Hibernating myoca...
Article
Mitral valve leaflet calcification
Mitral valve leaflet calcification or mitral leaflet calcification refers to the deposition of calcium on the mitral valvular leaflets as opposed to mitral annular calcification in the mitral annulus. It has been associated with mitral stenosis 1,2.
Epidemiology
Mitral leaflet calcification h...
Article
Sinus of Valsalva aneurysm
A sinus of Valsalva aneurysm refers to abnormal dilatation of the sinus of valsalva and is a cause of thoracic aortic dilatation. Sinus of Valsalva aneurysms arise from one of the aortic sinuses. They are either congenital or acquired.
Epidemiology
There is a male predilection (M:F ratio being...
Article
Deer horn sign
The deer horn sign is a reliable sign and an important diagnostic clue of passive congestive hepatopathy due to heart failure on ultrasonography 1. In the deer horn sign, the head is formed by a dilated inferior cava, and the engorged hepatic veins resemble horns. It has also been described as t...
Article
Cardiac fibroma
Cardiac fibromas, also known as cardiac fibromatosis, are benign congenital cardiac tumors that usually manifest in children.
Epidemiology
Cardiac fibromas are tumors that primarily affect children (most cases are detected in infants or in utero) with a ratio of 4:1 compared with adults 5. Th...
Article
Cardiac undifferentiated pleomorphic sarcoma
Cardiac undifferentiated pleomorphic sarcomas are highly malignant mesenchymal tumors of the heart.
Terminology
Terms that are no longer recommended for use include ‘intimal sarcoma’, ‘undifferentiated sarcoma’ and ‘undifferentiated spindle cell sarcoma’ 1.
Epidemiology
Cardiac undifferentia...
Article
Congenital heart disease chest x-ray (an approach)
With the advent of echocardiography, and cardiac CT and MRI, the role of chest x-rays in evaluating congenital heart disease has been largely relegated to one of historical and academic interest. However, they continue to crop up in radiology exams. In most instances a definite diagnosis cannot ...
Article
Waterston shunt
A Waterston shunt is a form of palliative surgery performed in patients with tetralogy of Fallot prior to the ability to repair the defect. It consists of a shunt formed between the ascending aorta and the right pulmonary artery.
This does not relieve the right ventricular outflow obstruction, ...
Article
Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome
The Wolff-Parkinson-White syndrome describes paroxysmal tachydysrhythmias in the presence of a specific accessory pathway which allows direct electrical connection between the atria and ventricles, which usually exclusively occurs via the atrioventricular (AV) node. The accessory pathway is usua...
Article
Dilated cardiomyopathy
Dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) is defined as left ventricular chamber dilation with global or regional systolic dysfunction not sufficiently explained by abnormal loading conditions (such as valvular heart disease, congenital heart disease, hypertension etc.) or coronary artery disease 1-4.
It m...
Article
Myocardial mapping
Myocardial mapping or parametric mapping of the heart is one of various magnetic resonance imaging techniques, which has evolved and been increasingly used in the last decade for non-invasive tissue characterization of the myocardium 1-5. Unlike normal T1-, T2- or T2*- images, parametric mapping...