Assessment of the liver strain among cirrhotic and normal livers using tagged MRI.
OBJECTIVE
To use magnetization tagged magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) (tag-MRI) to quantify cardiac induced liver strain and compare strain of cirrhotic and normal livers.


METHODS
Tag-MRI was performed at 1.5T on eight subjects with no history of liver disease and 10 patients with liver cirrhosis. A breath-hold peripheral pulse-gated (PPG) conventional tag-MRI cine sequence was performed with planes to include the left lobe of the liver and the inferior wall of the heart. Commercially available software HARP (Diagnosoft, Palo Alto, CA) was used for image analysis and strain calculation. Three regions-of-interest (ROIs) were selected: segment II of the liver near the heart (A), right liver lobe far from the heart (B), and the left ventricular wall (C). The average and maximal (max) strain were measured in A, B, and C. The maximum strains were used to generate a cardiac-corrected strain gradient: (maxA-maxB)/maxC. Results were compared with Student's t-test (SPSS, Chicago, IL).


RESULTS
In subjects with no history of liver disease vs. cirrhotic patients, the average strain was 22% ± 7% vs. 4% ± 3% (P < 0.001), the max strain was 63% ± 15% vs. 17% ± 5% (P < 0.001), and the corrected strain gradient was 0.52 ± 0.16 vs. 0.11% ± 0.08%.


CONCLUSIONS
There is a significant difference in liver strain measured with tag-MRI between subjects with no history of liver disease and patients with cirrhosis.
University of Washington, Department of Radiology, Seattle, Washington, USA. mannellilorenzo@yahoo.it
Lorenzo
L
Mannelli
Gregory J
GJ
Wilson
Theodore J
TJ
Dubinsky
Christopher A
CA
Potter
Puneet
P
Bhargava
Carlos
C
Cuevas
Ken F
KF
Linnau
Orpheus
O
Kolokythas
Martin L
ML
Gunn
Jeffrey H
JH
Maki
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000465:Algorithms; D055119:Elastic Modulus; D054459:Elasticity Imaging Techniques / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007089:Image Enhancement / Q000379:methods; D007090:Image Interpretation, Computer-Assisted / Q000379:methods*; D008099:Liver / Q000473:pathology* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D008103:Liver Cirrhosis / Q000473:pathology* / Q000503:physiopathology*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity