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©The Author(s) 2015. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Transplant. Dec 24, 2015; 5(4): 348-353
Published online Dec 24, 2015. doi: 10.5500/wjt.v5.i4.348
Published online Dec 24, 2015. doi: 10.5500/wjt.v5.i4.348
Role of cardiovascular imaging in selection of donor hearts
Nandini Nair, Division of Cardiology, Texas Tech Health Sciences Center, Lubbock, TX 79430, United States
Enrique Gongora, Memorial Cardiac and Vascular Institute, Hollywood, FL 33021, United States
Author contributions: Nair N and Gongora E contributed equally to this work including conceptual design and manuscript preparation; both authors have read and approved the paper.
Conflict-of-interest statement: Drs. Nair and Gongora declare that they have no competing interests.
Data sharing statement: Details pertaining to this systematic review are available from the corresponding author at nandini.nair@gmail.com
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article which was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Correspondence to: Nandini Nair, MD, PhD, FACC, FSVM, FACP, Professor of Medicine, Division of Cardiology, Texas Tech Health Sciences Center, 4601, 4th Street, Lubbock, TX 79430, United States. nandini.nair@gmail.com
Telephone: +1-610-8641687
Received: May 28, 2015
Peer-review started: June 1, 2015
First decision: August 14, 2015
Revised: September 2, 2015
Accepted: October 12, 2015
Article in press: October 13, 2015
Published online: December 24, 2015
Peer-review started: June 1, 2015
First decision: August 14, 2015
Revised: September 2, 2015
Accepted: October 12, 2015
Article in press: October 13, 2015
Published online: December 24, 2015
Core Tip
Core tip: The increase in the number of patients on the cardiac transplant waiting list unfortunately has not been accompanied by a concomitant increase in the number of donor organs. In the present era of advanced imaging techniques it is imperative to use them for a thorough assessment of organs before they are deemed unfit for use. Three-dimensional echocardiography and cardiac magnetic resonance imaging are powerful techniques that could be used for assessing hearts that do not pass the standard tests. This review highlights potential imaging techniques that can be used to assess donor hearts for better utilization of organs.