AngioLab: Patient-specic management of intracranial aneurysms,

M.C. VILLA-URIOL; I. LARRABIDE; A. F. FRANGI

Houston

Conferencia; Live Interventional Neuroradiology Conference (LINC) in conjunction with Intracranial Stent Meeting (ICS) 2010; 2010

Texas Heart Institute

Background and purpose In clinical practice there are state-of-the-art imaging and treatment techniques, but diagnostic and intervention decisions are still based on simple measurements. Recent works have shown that the multifactorial mechanisms involved in the aneurysm genesis, growth and rupture could be computationally modeled. Within the Virtual Physiological Human framework, several software development initiatives aim at the integration of such computational models in a single unified framework. This paper describes the tools currently integrated in AngioLab as well as the results of its first evaluation by clinicians during the 2nd European Society for Minimally Invasive Neurovascular Treatment (ESMINT) Teaching Course held in December 2009 in Barcelona, Spain.Materials and methodsAngioLab is a software tool developed within the GIMIAS framework and is part of a more ambitious pipeline for the integrated management of cerebral aneurysms. GIMIAS (Graphical Interface for Medical Image Analysis and Simulation) is a workflow-oriented environment and provides an open source framework for the fast development of biomedical imaging and modeling  research tools and clinical prototypes. Currently, AngioLab includes the Automated Morphological Analysis (angio morphology plug-in) and the Endovascular Treatment Planning (stenting plug-in). These tools were evaluated by 23 clinicians, with different levels of experience (junior (52%) and experienced (48%)), in the age range of 20-29 (9%), 30-39 (65%), 40-49 (22%), 50-59 (4%) and coming from 10 different countries (Italy, France, Spain, Dominican Republic, UK, Belgium, Switzerland, Tunisia, Denmark and Chile). All participants responded a questionnaire about the course design, the software usability, the Automated Morphological Analysis and the Endovascular Treatment Planning tools. Discussion and conclusionsIn general, the results provided by the Automated Morphological Analysis (angio morphology plug-in) and the Endovascular Treatment Planning (stenting plug-in) were considered as relevant and meaningful. Clinicians recognized and classified the tools provided by AngioLab as an emerging need able to influence their opinions during their daily clinical practice. The results obtained in this evaluation not only support the future extensions of AngioLab and the validity of GIMIAS as an efficient development framework of research tools and prototypes, but also the idea behind the Virtual Physiological Human as an integrative framework towards the in silico modeling of the human body.