Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jun 10, 2026

Estimating Bilateral Atrial Function by Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance Feature Tracking in Patients with Paroxysmal Atrial Fibrillation
08:10

Estimating Bilateral Atrial Function by Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance Feature Tracking in Patients with Paroxysmal Atrial Fibrillation

Published on: July 20, 2022

Left atrium incisure curvature: an indicator for predicting atrial fibrillation-related cardioembolism

Jianli He1, Yuanyuan Wang2, Jun Hou3

  • 1Department of Neurology, The Fourth Affiliated Hospital of Soochow University, Suzhou, China.

BMC Cardiovascular Disorders
|June 9, 2026
PubMed

Insights

Left atrial incisure curvature effectively predicts stroke and embolic events in atrial fibrillation (AF) patients. This imaging marker offers improved accuracy over existing risk scores for identifying high-thrombotic risk.

Area of Science:

  • Cardiology
  • Medical Imaging
  • Biomedical Engineering

Background:

  • Current stroke risk scores for atrial fibrillation (AF) patients lack accuracy for individual risk prediction.
  • Distinguishing high-thrombotic risk in AF patients is clinically challenging.
  • Novel imaging biomarkers are needed to enhance stroke risk prediction in AF.

Purpose of the Study:

  • To develop and validate a simple, effective method for predicting stroke and systemic embolic events in AF patients.
  • To assess the utility of left atrial (LA) incisure curvature as a novel imaging biomarker for cardioembolic events.

Main Methods:

  • Retrospective analysis of 169 AF patients categorized by AF type and cardioembolic events.
  • Development of border detection and LA incisure curvature computation algorithms using chest CT images.
  • Quantitative analysis of LA incisure curvature to correlate with cardioembolic event occurrence.

Main Results:

  • LA incisure curvature demonstrated distinct values across groups with varying AF progression and cardioembolic events.
  • The developed algorithm achieved 85.21% accuracy, 96% sensitivity, and 80.7% specificity in predicting cardioembolic events.
  • Disappearance of LA incisure on CT imaging correlated with AF progression and cardioembolic events.

Conclusions:

  • Left atrial incisure curvature is a promising imaging indicator for predicting AF-related strokes and systemic embolic events.
  • This quantitative imaging marker may aid in identifying high-risk AF patients.
  • Further multicenter validation is recommended to confirm these findings.
Abstract

Keywords:
Atrial FibrillationCardioembolic eventLeft Atrium IncisureStrokeSystemic Embolism

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