Bringing a child into this world is one of life’s most dramatic events, particularly a child with congenital heart disease. To prepare parents and clinicians for early intervention, early detection during pregnancy is crucial but echocardiography is not always conclusive. Cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (CMR) with detailed 4D blood flow and 4D anatomy visualization (3D CINE) may provide improved diagnosis, but is difficult to achieve without assessment of the fetal heartbeat. Furthermore, these long MRI measurements necessitate robustness to fetal bulk motion and maternal breathing.
With this grant from the Open Technology Programme of NWO (€850.000), we will appoint one PhD student that will join the company Northh Medical Imaging in Hamburg, Germany, for two years to make their MR-compatible echo-Doppler device to trigger an MRI sequence with the fetal heartbeat more robust to fetal motion. In addition, we will appoint one PhD student to the Applied MR Physics group at Amsterdam UMC to make the 4D blood flow and 3D CINE MRI sequence more robust to fetal bulk motion and maternal breathing motion, in collaboration with Philips and Pie Medical Imaging BV. The new device and the new sequences will subsequently be tested and validated in pregnant sheep in collaboration with the animal research center of the Maastricht UMC. Finally, we will implement the use of the device and the new sequences for clinical application in the UMC Utrecht and Amsterdam UMC.
About the NWO Open Technology programme
The Open Technology Programme is open to excellent research aimed at the possible implementation of the results. The programme offers companies and other organisations an easily accessible way of becoming involved in scientific research that leads to applicable knowledge. In the Open Technology Programme, research applications can be submitted the whole year round. In September, six proposals received funding. For more information, visit the NWO website.