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A healthy resting heart rate beats between 60 to 100 times every minute. It’s an amazing wonder of human anatomy—and something many of us take for granted. That’s why American Heart Month is so important. Every February, organizations across the nation make it their mission to raise awareness about heart disease—the leading cause of death in the United States—and to promote heart-healthy habits.
Fujifilm is passionate about protecting patients’ tickers! We do it through hard work and innovation—creating state-of-the-art technologies to assist clinicians in quickly and accurately diagnosing various types of heart disease. In honor of American Heart Month, we sat down with Don Boshela, CT Product Marketing Manager at FUJIFILM Healthcare Americas Corporation to discuss heart disease prevention and diagnosis, and the unique cardiac features of Fujifilm’s SCENARIA View computed tomography (CT) system.
Can you tell us a little bit about the prevalence of heart disease in the United States?
Boshela: Unfortunately, in the U.S., heart disease is the leading cause of death for men, women, and people of most racial and ethnic groups. In fact, one person dies every 33 seconds from cardiovascular disease. Some of the most recent mortality rates we have are from 2022. That year alone, 702,880 people died from heart disease—that’s 1 in every 5 deaths. So, the statistics are quite staggering.
Why is American Heart Month so important?
Boshela: Raising awareness of cardiovascular disease is imperative for two reasons. First, when healthcare consumers are educated, they can take action to lower their risk. Improving lifestyle habits like quitting smoking, eating a healthier diet, and getting more exercise can really reduce a person’s chance of developing heart issues. That’s the preventative piece.
Secondly, people need to know when to see a physician. By informing the public about symptoms they shouldn’t ignore – like light-headedness – which might be associated with high blood pressure. The bottom line is that early detection and proper diagnosis of heart disease can improve patient outcomes. That’s the goal of all stakeholders who participate in American Heart Month, including Fujifilm.
Tell us about Fujifilm’s SCENARIA View CT system and the role it plays in detection and diagnosis of cardiovascular disease.
Boshela: Fujifilm launched the SCENARIA View Focus Edition CT, specifically for cardiac applications. It’s a premium scanner with an advanced Cardiac Motion Correction feature, called Cardio StillShot. The system is designed for routine and advanced clinical applications, including coronary computed tomography angiography (CCTA), interventional CT, extended coverage shuttle scanning for perfusion exams, and dual energy examinations.
Please expand on Cardio StillShot. What exactly is this feature and why is it beneficial?
Boshela: Everyone’s heart is unique, and the rhythm of the individual heart affects CT image quality. At heart rates below 60 beats per minute (BPM), there’s adequate time to take images between heartbeats. However, when heart rates rise above 60 and above it’s more challenging and difficult for CT to image the heart. The imaging time window becomes too short and can cause non-diagnostic images.
Cardio StillShot addresses this problem. It provides motion correction for the whole heart, including arteries and valves. Its revolutionary, proprietary algorithm creates clear, high-quality images for challenging heart rates.
Without adequate temporal resolution, increased motion can make CT imaging unreliable for accurate diagnoses. Cardio StillShot corrects motion by acquiring two data sets within the target reconstruction phase. These data sets are compared against each other as voxels to detect and calculate motion. With this motion data, Cardio StillShot generates a Four D-Motion Vector Field to deliver images that are artifact-free. 
The final image has an effective temporal resolution of up to 28 milliseconds compared to 175 milliseconds without Cardio StillShot. That’s an improvement of more than six times! So you can see, this unique feature is very beneficial in that it allows cardiac specialists to get the right image for diagnosis—right away.
What other cardiac features does SCENARIA View boast that providers should know about?
Boshela: SCENARIA View’s advanced optional cardiac package provides automated features to ensure optimal pre-scan protocol selection and post-scan selection of the most informative cardiac phase images for enhanced clinical results and workflow.
For example, there is Calcium Scoring which checks for and measures the amount of calcium buildup in the coronary arteries. This helps assess the risk of coronary artery disease and is useful for guiding preventive treatments in patients.
There’s also the ability to perform Coronary CT angiogram (CCTA) with SCENARIA View. This helps detect coronary plaque buildup and identifies any narrowing or blockages in the coronary arteries. It can also assess other heart features, such as the muscle, valves, or clots. It’s especially useful for patients with acute or stable symptoms who have no prior history of coronary artery disease.
I also want to mention that our technology is compatible with software that calculates fractional flow reserve (FFR)—which is key to treatment. FFR is a post processing procedure used to assess the severity of coronary artery stenosis by measuring blood pressure and flow within the coronary arteries. SCENARIA View cardiac scan data integrates with HeartFlow software to calculate the patient’s FFR, aiding in the development of an optimal treatment protocol.
Have any Fujifilm SCENARIA View customers shared feedback on the cardiac features of the technology?
Boshela: Yes, we’ve received very positive feedback from countless customers, including Tallahassee Memorial Hospital, a 772-bed hospital system. The health system’s CT team worked directly with Fujifilm to create Cardio StillShot motion correction, which they say has allowed them to scan more patients with higher heart rates. According to Spencer Dalton, BHA, RT (R) (CT), CT Manager, “StillShot has allowed us to capture quality images so these types of patients can avoid going to the cath lab and having additional studies performed on them.”
Dalton also told us one of her favorite things about SCENARIA View is the side table shift because it allows her when working with cardiac CTs to center the patient’s heart directly into the iso-center of the gantry. She says with this centering feature the CT techs can also use a smaller bowtie filter and get lower dose and better-quality images of the heart.
Tallahassee Memorial Hospital system now has four SCENARIA View CT scanners installed, with plans for more as they expand their presence in Florida’s Big Bend region.
That kind of vote of confidence confirms delivery on Fujifilm’s vision for cardiac CT and patients’ health.
While American Heart Month is observed once a year, it’s important that patients are aware of their family history and talk to their doctors if they have heart symptoms, including chest pain, shortness of breath, palpitations and more. Heart attacks can be prevented if caught in its earliest stages, and advanced medical technology is at the cornerstone of combating heart disease.