**5. Conclusions**

Recently, the focus of the development of pediatric echocardiography has shifted toward accurate assessment of myocardial function and precise presentation of cardiac morphology. As in other areas of ultrasound examinations, there is an increasing need for bedside targeted echocardiography that provides fast answers to major clinical challenges. Therefore, some echocardiographic methods becoming increasingly useful, such as functional echocardiography, cardiac deformation imaging, and 3D echocardiography.

### *Clinical Benefits of New Echocardiographic Methods DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.104808*

Functional echocardiography enables real-time evaluation of cardiac performance, identifying the nature of cardiovascular compromise, guiding therapeutic decisions, and monitoring response to treatment. An additional advantage of functional echocardiography is the noninvasiveness of the method. The decision-making process is easier with further information provided by targeted echocardiography, which also reduces a substantial proportion of interventions. Standardized training and close collaboration with pediatric cardiologists are essential for ensuring patients' safety and quality of examination, especially in neonatal units where the risk of a critical or major CHD is higher compared to older children. Future research should address short-term cardiovascular effects and long-term outcomes of functional echocardiography.

Myocardial deformation imaging may be beneficial for the detection of early ventricular dysfunction, especially where classical methods are unreliable. A better understanding of patterns of dysfunction may help clinicians to identify causative factors for global and regional ventricular dysfunction. Patients with progressive heart disease or systemic disease affecting the heart may be identified and treated timely. Furthermore, closer monitoring of the effects of therapy is also an important advantage of myocardial deformation. New methods of myocardial function assessment have already shown great promise in several areas of pediatric echocardiography, but the main limitation remains that strain values vary among methods, modalities, and software versions. Further investigation is warranted for the potential clinical applications in a pediatric population, especially in defining the normal range and maturational changes in strain.

3DE is a very promising and topical new echocardiographic method; recently, it has become more popular in patients with CHD, as it allows the visualization of defects in three dimensions, with opportunities for increased appreciation of complex spatial relationships. A current limitation of 3DE is a restriction of spatial and temporal resolution. Based on 3D modeling, virtual surgery may even be possible, to optimize device design for individual patients, or to determine the optimal surgical technique. In a near future, we are likely to see increased use of 3DE during transcatheter interventions and heart surgeries.
