Cardiac Autonomic Nervous System and Ventricular Arrhythmias: The Role of Radionuclide Molecular Imaging.
Diagnostics (Basel) 2021;
11:diagnostics11071273. [PMID:
34359356 PMCID:
PMC8303842 DOI:
10.3390/diagnostics11071273]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 2] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.7] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/01/2021] [Revised: 07/12/2021] [Accepted: 07/14/2021] [Indexed: 12/30/2022] Open
Abstract
Widely established compared to myocardial perfusion imaging, cardiac autonomous nervous system (CANS) assessment by radiopharmaceutical means is of potential use especially to arrhythmogenic diseases not correlated with anatomic or functional alterations revealed by classical imaging techniques. Molecular imaging of both pre- and postsynaptic functions of the autonomous nervous system is currently feasible, since single photon emission tomography (SPECT) and positron emission tomography (PET) have the ability to reveal the insights of molecular pathophysiology depicting both sympathetic and parasympathetic imbalance in discrete heart pathologies. This review provides not only a brief presentation of radiopharmaceuticals used for non-invasive CANS imaging in the case of ventricular arrhythmias, but also a current update on ventricular tachycardias, cardiomyopathies, Brugada and Long QT syndrome literature.
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