Inter- & Intra-visit Reproducibility of Free-Breathing Magnetic Resonance Imaging in Pediatric Cystic Fibrosis Lung Disease

Abstract

Free-breathing lung MRI has been shown to be a responsive measure to CF pulmonary exacerbations treatments but have not been used to track stable disease progression longitudinally. In this study we determined the intra- and inter-scan reproducibility of free-breathing lung MRI in healthy and stable pediatric CF across 2 visits and compared to hyperpolarized Xenon MRI (Xe-MRI). Xe-MRI and free-breathing lung show a high intra-scan reproducibility in stable CF subjects, but free-breathing lung MRI showed a low inter-scan reproducibility. However, free-breathing lung MRI significantly correlated with Xe-MRI suggesting that it may be an alternative to expensive, and less wide-spread Xe-MRI.