Clinical Utility of Continuous Non-contact Cardiac Function Monitoring via Fiber-Optic Micro-Vibration Sensing System-based Myocardial Performance Index in Heart Failure Patients with Reduced Ejection Fraction

Abstract

Introduction Continuous monitoring of cardiac function may contribute to improving clinical outcomes in heart failure (HF) patients. A fiber-optic micro-vibration sensing system (FO-MVSS) that was previously developed by our group could make possible the non-contact and continuous measurement of the myocardial performance index (MPI) to assess cardiac function. However, the utility of MPI obtained by FO-MVSS (MPIFO-MVSS) in HF patients requires investigation. Methods Utilizing a case-control design, 72 HF patients and 72 control patients matched for age, gender and body mass index were recruited. Both FO-MVSS and echocardiography were used to measure the duration of the various phases of the cardiac cycle, thereby deriving the corresponding MPI. The MPIFO-MVSS of 23 hospitalized patients with HF was continuously monitored to evaluate its predictive value for the improvement of cardiac function. Results The MPIFO-MVSS was in excellent agreement with the MPI obtained by echocardiography (MPIecho) (intra-class correlation coefficient: 0.94, p<0.001). The MPIFO-MVSS exhibited statistically significant correlations with left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) (r=-0.78, p<0.001) and N-terminal prohormone brain natriuretic peptide (NT-proBNP) (r=0.66, p<0.001). The MPIFO-MVSS had an excellent performance in discriminating HF patients from control patients, with an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.98 (p<0.001). Moreover, among continuously monitored patients, the change in MPIFO-MVSS was predictive of clinical outcomes (the kappa coefficient: 0.91, p<0.001). Conclusion Our study presents a novel approach to using non-contact MPIFO-MVSS for continuous cardiac function evaluation in patients with HF. The MPIFO-MVSS may serve as an accurate, sensitive, and non-invasive indicator of cardiac dysfunction.