Measuring Tau, Left ventricular relaxation time constant

[cardio]

Left ventricular relaxation time constant, tau, is the best index to describe left ventricular diastolic function, but few clinicians are using it at present, why?

Techinically, non-invasive measurement of tau is challenging, or a mission impossible for a busy lab. Theoretically, the method was developed on an assumption which is against Weiss’ original work.

Now I found some formulas to do it. The development of those formulas is based on Weiss’ original work, simplified Bernoulli’s equation and universal mathematical laws. On top of that, once those formulas are integrated into echo machines, calculation of tau will be very easy. Here it is:

http://www.pubmedcentral.nih.gov/articlerender.fcgi?artid=2570574

A famous imaging processing company almost put those formulas into their software package but later they dropped the idea for they “don’t have raw data” which might make the calculation not as accurate as expected. Next I am going to contact with echo machine manufacturing companies…which is of course an odyssey journey, I should not bother here.

Please allow me to share this idea with everyone and any comments are welcomed and any relevant questions will be answered.

Thank you!

Xufang Bai, RDCS(AE), RVT(VT), Chinese MD&PhD