Doctors using digital replicas of patients' hearts, known as "digital twins," improved cardiac ablation outcomes for individuals with life-threatening arrhythmias, according to an April 1 announcement from Johns Hopkins University. The first clinical trials of this technology showed that testing procedures on digital twins before performing them on actual patients led to faster and more accurate treatments, reducing the recurrence of arrhythmias compared to traditional methods.
This development is significant because arrhythmias such as ventricular tachycardia can be difficult to treat effectively. Ablation procedures often have low success rates and may need to be repeated several times, increasing the risk of scarring and damage to the heart. By allowing doctors to simulate various treatment scenarios beforehand, digital twins could help make these interventions safer and more effective.
The study was published in the New England Journal of Medicine and demonstrated both safety and promising results for the new approach. "For patients, digital twins can be life-changing and life-saving," said Jonathan Chrispin, a cardiologist specializing in treating arrhythmias. "We show we can make their procedures safer, shorter and more effective by targeting only the critical portions of the heart."
Researchers created personalized digital twins for each participant in a Food and Drug Administration-approved trial called TWIN-VT. The models were based on three-dimensional imaging from contrast-enhanced MRI scans. These computer models allowed doctors to predict which areas of the heart were causing abnormal rhythms and plan optimal treatment strategies before performing real-life ablations.
Senior author Natalia Trayanova said: "In the patient's digital twin, we can try different scenarios for treatment before we treat the actual patient and provide the treating physician with the best, most optimal scenario, minimizing damage to the heart, and increasing the potential for a successful treatment." After ablations guided by these predictions, all ten participants remained free from arrhythmias more than a year later—a result surpassing traditional success rates.
Trayanova added: "We show the technology isn't merely feasible, it has excellent outcomes. This demonstrates a crowning achievement in this technology that allows us to go further toward a larger clinical trial." The team plans further studies involving more participants as well as expanding access by making desktop versions available for clinicians.
