Development of New Left Atrial Anatomical Models for the Study of the Left Atrial Appendage Implications in Atrial Fibrillation

Abstract

Atrial fibrillation is associated with a five-fold increase of the stroke risk. Left atrial appendage (LAA) is the atrial site with the highest blood stasis risk, increasing thrombus formation and stroke. Recent studies have been focused on the association between the left atrial appendage anatomical features and the stroke risk. However, conflicting results have been published. In this context, clinical studies suggested the stroke risk stratification could be improved by using haemodynamics information on the left atrium and mainly on the left atrial appendage. Therefore, the aim of this study was the design and development of a method which enabled to reconstruct and generate several LA anatomical models, where each one was characterized by a different LAA morphology. These anatomical models represent the computational domain for the computational fluid dynamics simulations of the haemodynamics within the left atrium and LAA.