UC San Diego

Coarctation of the aorta in childhood and adolescent can be successfully treated by percutaneous stent implantation. To assess left ventricular remodeling and mechanics following stent angioplasty in patients with coarctation of the aorta, seven finite element biventricular models of four aortic coarctation patients were built and left ventricle mass was calculated. The geometric models were segmented from cardiac MRI, fitted to finite element meshes and interpolated as cubic Hermite meshes. Left ventricular wall thickness was found from the models. Clinical characteristics before and after treatment and the calculated LV mass were evaluated. Two of the patients appear to have ventricular remodeling and the other two have normal ventricles without hypertrophy