With artificial intelligence (AI), researchers believe that the spherical appearance of the heart is a sign of the onset of cardiomyopathy.
According to a study led by researchers at Stanford University in California, the roundness (or sphericity) of the heart could be important for general health.
Aided by an AI, they sifted through nearly 39,000 MRI scans of healthy hearts, taken from a biobank, and the shape of your heart may well play a role.
A round heart for more risk?
Thus, according to them, a more spherical (round) shape could be associated with a 47% greater risk of developing cardiomyopathy.
Shoa Clarke, cardiologist who participated in the study, summarizes:
Most people who practice cardiology are well aware that after a person develops heart disease, the heart will look more spherical.. It is not a guarantee that having high sphericity means you will have a clinical manifestation. It’s just a marker for high risk people. Other factors could be at play.
The study in detail
The shape of the left ventricle, which sends oxygen-rich blood around the body, has been observed.
But also in parallel, the health records of the participants in order to identify those showing certain genetic markers linked to heart disease.
The interest of artificial intelligence
What this study reveals is the growing interest in the use of AI in the “reading” of medical images, which could well hide new health indicators.
AT Fox News Digitalthe cardiologist indicated more generally:
A key point of our work is that current core assessment strategies are good, but they were established decades ago, before the era of big data. We now have the opportunity to think more broadly and ask ourselves what other features of the heart can tell us about risk and disease biology.