Point-of-Care Ultrasound
Ultrasound performed by the treating clinician at the bedside, typically with a portable device, for focused clinical questions. Cardiac POCUS is a fast-growing use case.
POCUS describes ultrasound performed by the treating clinician, emergency physician, intensivist, hospitalist, primary-care physician, at the patient bedside for a focused clinical question, rather than as a comprehensive imaging study by a sonographer in an echo lab.
Cardiac POCUS workflows include rapid LVEF estimation, identification of pericardial effusion, gross right-heart dilation, and inferior-vena-cava collapsibility for volume status. Increasingly used in primary-care and community-screening settings for undiagnosed heart failure.
AI-assisted POCUS expands the modality's reach by giving non-cardiologist clinicians an automated, quantitative LVEF and chamber-size measurement on each scan, addressing the operator-dependence concern that has historically limited POCUS.