An advanced vision of magnetocardiography as an unrivalled method for a more comprehensive non-invasive clinical electrophysiological assessment

Abstract

Decades of experimental and clinical studies, along with the most recent clinical trials, have demonstrated the diagnostic potential of magnetocardiography, particularly for the non-invasive early diagnosis of myocardial ischemia. It has also proven to be a valuable clinical tool for monitoring fetal well-being, normal growth, prenatal arrhythmias, and risk markers for sudden death. Such applications have recently received official recognition from Health Canada and the American Heart Association. This unquestionable success, and the additional evidence of magnetocardiography's high sensitivity in diagnosing infiltrative and inflammatory cardiomyopathies, has sparked renewed interest among clinicians.

However, while these aforementioned applications are likely to significantly influence the broader clinical adoption of magnetocardiography, the general focus on these areas has shifted attention away from what we have always regarded as the fundamental strength of contactless cardiac magnetic field mapping: its unique ability to bridge the gap between experimental electrophysiology at the cellular level and non-invasive clinical assessments of human electrophysiology.

This review aims to engage readers by sharing our vision, experience, and several key research milestones, emphasizing the lesser-explored yet significant potential of magnetocardiography. Specifically, it highlights its unique capability to detect electrically silent phenomena that may be critical for the timely and accurate identification of arrhythmogenic focal electrotonic and vortex currents, which can trigger or sustain life-threatening arrhythmias.