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Heart & Vascular

Cardiovascular Advanced Imaging

Find a hospital that provides Cardiovascular Advanced Imaging

Intermountain Healthcare utilizes an integrated system approach to deliver the best patient care, consistently and at the lowest appropriate cost. We are able to use the expertise from our hospitals, clinics, and health plan to ensure excellent and consistent care no matter which Intermountain facility you visit.

Find a hospital that provides Cardiovascular Advanced Imaging

Cardiovascular Advanced Imaging Procedures

3D Echo
Some echocardiograms are enhanced with 3D technology so that the doctor can see a three-dimensional picture and manipulate it to see the heart from multiple angles. This technology provides views not possible with a conventional 2D echo.

Cardiac CT
A Cardiac CT scan creates a 3-D image by combining x-rays of thin cross-sections of your heart. After a contrast dye is injected, you lie on a table that slowly moves you through a CT machine as a rotating x-ray tube takes the cross-section images. Each x-ray dose is an extremely low level and lasts just a fraction of a second. A Cardiac CT scan provides highly detailed images that are helpful in detecting problems with the heart and arteries.

Cardiac Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Cardiac magnetic resonance (CMR) imaging is an MRI for your heart. It uses powerful magnets to create pictures of the heart and coronary arteries. During this test, you’re placed in a chamber surrounded by a magnetic field. In response to the magnetic force, the atoms that make up your body’s tissues produce weak signals. With the help of a computer, these signals are magnified and recorded. They can then be used to create cross-section views (“slices”) of your heart as well as three-dimensional images. These can be still or motion pictures.

CMR can reveal the structure and size of the heart chambers, wall, and valves. It can also be used to show blood flow to and through the heart, and measure your ejection fraction. These images can help healthcare providers determine the extent of heart muscle damage (as from a heart attack), assess blood flow problems, and detect and evaluate leaking in the heart’s chambers and valves.

Intracardiac Echo (ICE)
An intracardiac echo (ICE) involves inserting a tiny catheter with an ultrasound sensor into a blood vessel, then passing it into the heart to enhance the images of the internal structures of the heart. ICD is often used to provide guidance as devices or balloons are placed into the heart.

IVUS
Intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) is used to help diagnose coronary artery disease. IVUS uses high-frequency sound waves to create a motion picture of the interior of your coronary arteries. In the cardiac cath lab, a device called a transducer is attached to a catheter, and threaded through an artery into your heart. The transducer sends out sound waves that bounce off the artery structures and return as echoes. These echoes are converted into images on a monitor.

Transesophageal Echo (TEE)
Before heart surgery, or if a standard echo produces poor images, a healthcare provider may order a transesophageal echocardiogram (TEE). With TEE, the transducer is placed so that it rests directly behind the heart. From this vantage point, the transducer can obtain high-quality images of the heart from all sides.