DIRECT CORONARY COUPLING APPROACH FOR COMPUTING FFRCT

With the advances in computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and image-based modeling techniques, fractional flow reserve (FFR) can be computed from coronary computed tomography angiography (CTA) scans (FFRCT). However, this non-invasive approach requires large-scale computational resources, which limits its application in routine clinical setting. A 3D–0D coupling approach is proposed to improve the coupling efficiency of FFRCT. Aortic–root is modeled by a lumped parameter model and connected with the models of left ventricle and systemic circulation. With this approach, the interested coronary regions can be directly coupled to the lumped parameter model, resulting in a significant reduction (up to 20 times reduction) in the volume of the CFD computing domain. The proposed approach is applied to a patient-specific model and compared with previous non-reduced approach. Results show that the computed coronary flow rates, pressure waveforms and FFRCT contours by the proposed approach are consistent well with that of the non-reduced approach. These results demonstrate that the proposed approach can reduce the CFD computing domain of FFRCT significantly while maintaining the similar accuracy as compared with the non-reduced approach, and it can be further employed to promote FFRCT in routine clinical setting.