Strain Imaging

What is Strain Imaging?

Strain imaging is an echocardiogram used to detect the deformation of muscular heart tissue. It uses cardiac ultrasound to evaluate the working function of cardiac muscles. This non-invasive technique is capable of detecting even minor variations in the heart function. Cardiologists mainly suggest this technique to examine the heart chambers and the blood flow and pump through it.

Why is it performed?

The strain imaging echo is mainly used to:

• Keep a check on the patients who are on cardio-toxic medications during the tumor treatment.
• To evaluate patients who had pacemaker implants, cardiomyopathy, and pericardial diseases.
• Cardiac status evaluation before heart surgery
• To evaluate patients who have undergone radiation therapy to the chest.

How is it performed?

Like used in every other echocardiogram, a transducer is used here over your specific chest areas. The transducer produces sound waves to your heart, and these waves transmit back from the heart to the machine. The machine turns these waves into images for further examination. The image will have full information about the structure and function of your cardiac muscles, heart valves, and chambers.