Evaluation of Non-invasive Methods for the Detection of Acute Rejection in Heart Transplant Patients: Use of Echocardiography and Magnetocardiography (MCG) -Pilot Study

The purpose of this research study is to apply new non-invasive, no-risk techniques to a cardiac transplant population for assessment of their reliability in detecting heart transplant rejection.

Graft rejection remains a major factor limiting long-term survival despite continued advancement in the use of immunosuppression. Aggressive surveillance for the detection of acute rejection is therefore necessary. Repeated endomyocardial biopsy (EMB) (at least 11 times the first year after transplantation) remains the only reliable surveillance method available. EMB is expensive, invasive, inconvenient to the patient, and associated with a significant incidence of serious complications. Therefore, it would be very important for patient care if new no-risk methods would prove to be effective in surveillance of rejection.

This research study is designed to measure non-invasive ways to assess rejection along with the standard planned endomyocardial biopsies you will have after heart transplantation. First, the investigators plan to test the effectiveness of the investigational use of the CMI 2406 Magnetocardiograph that has been approved by the U.S Food and Drug Administration (FDA). While the device used in the study is FDA-approved for the non-invasive measurements and recordings of the heart's magnetic field reflecting the heart's electrical currents, it is not yet approved for the specific use of detection of transplant rejection.