Lung volume reproducibility under ABC control and self-sustained breath-holding

Area of Science:

• Medical Imaging
• Radiotherapy
• Respiratory Physiology

Background:

• The Active Breathing Coordinator (ABC) is used to induce breath-holds in CT, MRI, and radiotherapy for lung, breast, and liver cancer.
• Subject lung volume reproducibility is key to ABC effectiveness.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the intra-session and inter-session reproducibility of ABC-induced lung volumes during MRI.
• To compare ABC-induced breath-holds with operator-guided self-sustained breath-holds.
• To assess lung volume agreement across different ABC devices and imaging modalities.

Main Methods:

• Healthy volunteers underwent MRI scans with ABC-controlled breath-holds.
• Lung volumes were derived from 3D T1-weighted MRI datasets using semiautomatic delineation.
• Inter-observer variability was assessed (<6%).
• Intra-session and inter-session reproducibility were evaluated.
• Agreement with different ABC devices (MR, CT, breast radiotherapy) was analyzed.

Main Results:

• ABC equipment showed good intra-session (1.8% variability) and inter-session (3% variability) lung volume reproducibility.
• MR-assessed lung volumes were consistent across different ABC devices.
• ABC-controlled breath-holds demonstrated better lung volume agreement (1.8% variability) than self-controlled breath-holds (4.1% variability).

Conclusions:

• The Active Breathing Coordinator (ABC) provides superior lung volume reproducibility compared to self-controlled breath-holds for MRI.
• ABC technology offers consistent breath-hold control for enhanced accuracy in cancer imaging and radiotherapy across various modalities.