Multispectral optoacoustic tomography of systemic sclerosis

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Optics
• Medical Imaging
• Vascular Biology

Background:

• Systemic sclerosis (SSc) is a chronic autoimmune disease characterized by microvascular dysfunction.
• Current methods for assessing SSc-related microvascular changes are often invasive or lack sensitivity.
• There is a need for non-invasive imaging techniques to evaluate microvascular health in SSc.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the clinical feasibility of hybrid ultrasound/multispectral optoacoustic tomography (MSOT) for assessing microvascular dysfunction in SSc.
• To investigate MSOT's ability to differentiate between SSc patients and healthy controls.
• To correlate MSOT findings with SSc disease activity (progressive vs. stable).

Main Methods:

• A handheld ultrasound/MSOT imaging system was used.
• MSOT imaging was performed on the subcutaneous finger tissue of 7 SSc patients and 8 healthy volunteers.
• Semiquantitative MSOT values for deoxygenated hemoglobin (HbR), oxygenated hemoglobin (HbO2), and total hemoglobin (HbT) were analyzed.

Main Results:

• SSc patients exhibited significantly lower MSOT values for HbO2 and HbT compared to healthy volunteers (P < .05).
• Patients with progressive SSc showed significantly lower MSOT values than those with stable disease and healthy controls.
• MSOT successfully resolved microvascular differences in subcutaneous finger tissue.

Conclusions:

• Hybrid ultrasound/MSOT imaging is clinically feasible for assessing microvascular dysfunction in SSc.
• MSOT provides unique biological tissue properties for non-invasive SSc assessment and disease grading.
• MSOT holds potential for monitoring early therapeutic responses in SSc patients.