Doctors could soon be able to perform minimally invasive surgery on virtual versions of people's hearts to help ensure they make the best decisions for their patients before doing the procedure for real.

Computer technology has been developed that enables clinicians to create computer models of the heart, which not only reflect the individual anatomical make-up of the patient's real organ, but can also mimic accurately its movement as it beats.

A major new EU-funded research project, led by Philips Research, is developing the technology further so clinicians can also map the unique electrical and muscle activity within the heart. In the future, clinicians should be able to work out the likely impact of different treatment options and devise the best therapy for an individual patient.

It is predicted the models could help improve treatment of patients with heart failure, coronary artery disease and congenital heart defects. It could also be useful in patients with rhythm disorders where doctors during a minimally invasive procedure may use heat to destroy areas of tissue and restore the normal beat. Doctors now rely on experience to decide which areas to target, which is a challenge because electrical activity in a person's heart is subtly different. With a computer model which perfectly matches the patient's anatomy and mimics the electrical activity of their heart, doctors could instead know in advance the likely impact of destroying specific areas of tissue and so work out the likely success of the treatment for a patient.

The models are created by combining data from existing diagnostic technologies such as CT, MRI, ECGs as well as measuring blood flow and pressure in the coronary arteries.

The euHeart project involves public and private partners from 16 research, academic, industrial and medical organizations from six different European countries - Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, France and the UK. The project will run for four years and has a budget of 19 million Euros of which 14 million Euros will be provided by the EU.

The euHeart project complements the recently announced EU-funded HeartCycle project also led by Philips which focuses on the long term care of chronic heart disease patients.

Cardiovascular disease kills around 1.9 million people every year in the EU with the associated health costs estimated to be 105 billion Euros.

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