Radionuclide ventriculography

Radionuclide ventriculography (RNV) was the first reliable non-invasive method of assessing left ventricular (LV) function, and established nuclear cardiology as a clinical discipline. The subsequent development of other imaging modalities, particularly echocardiography, has led to a sharp decline in the number of studies performed, but RNV still has a role in situations where reproducible serial assessments of LV ejection fraction are required. Equilibrium RNV (ERNV) is the most straightforward and commonly performed style of RNV, and this chapter therefore focuses on ERNV, covering blood-pool labelling, principles of electrocardiogram (ECG) gating, acquisition, processing and interpretation, and clinical value in relation to ERNV. A section on first-pass radionuclide ventriculography is also included.