Hyperpolarized 3He magnetic resonance imaging of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: reproducibility at 3.0 tesla

We assessed subjects with stage II and stage III chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and age-matched healthy volunteers at a single center using (3)He magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) at 3.0 T. Measurements of the (3)He apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) and center coronal slice (3)He ventilation defect volume (VDV) were examined for same-day and 7-day reproducibility as well as subgroup comparisons.

Twenty-four subjects who provided written informed consent (15 males; mean age 67 +/-7 years) with stage II (n = 9), stage III COPD (n = 7), and age-matched healthy volunteers (n = 8) were enrolled based on their age and pulmonary function test results. All subjects underwent plethysmography, spirometry, and MRI at 3.0 T. The time frame between scans was 7 +/- 2 minutes (same-day rescan) and again 7 +/- 2 days later (7-day rescan). (3)He ADC and VDV reproducibility was evaluated using linear regression, intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) and Lin's concordance correlation coefficients (CCC).

ADC reproducibility was high for same-day rescan (r(2) = 0.934) and 7-day rescan (r(2) = 0.960, ICC and CCC of 0.96 and 0.98, respectively). Same-day rescan VDV reproducibility evaluated using the ICC and CCC (0.97 and 0.98, respectively) as well as linear regression (r(2) = 0.941) was also high, but VDV 7-day rescan reproducibility was lower and significantly different (r(2) = 0.576, P < .001, ICC 0.74, CCC 0.75, P < .01).

Hyperpolarized (3)He MRI was well-tolerated in subjects with stage II and stage III COPD. Seven-day repeated scanning was highly reproducible for ADC and moderately reproducible for VDV.