Evaluating Linear Heuristics for Ventricular Volume in Healthy Adults Using a Fully Automated Algorithm: Implications...

Area of Science:

• Neuroimaging
• Radiology
• Quantitative MRI

Background:

• Linear metrics approximate ventricular volume, crucial for rapid clinical assessment.
• Establishing normal values for these metrics in healthy adults is essential for accurate diagnosis.
• This study investigates the correlation between linear measures and actual lateral ventricular volume (LVV).

Purpose of the Study:

• To automatically extract linear measures of ventricular volume.
• To explore their correlation with lateral ventricular volume (LVV) in healthy adults.
• To comprehensively define normal values for these linear metrics.

Main Methods:

• Automatic extraction of Evans' ratio (ER), Frontal-Occipital Horn Ratio (FOHR), and anteroposterior lateral ventricle index (ALVI).
• Utilized an open MRI dataset of healthy adults (https://brain-development.org/ixi-dataset/).
• Employed Spearman rank correlation to assess the strength of correlation between indices and LVV, and LVV relative to supratentorial brain volume.

Main Results:

• The anteroposterior lateral ventricle index (ALVI) demonstrated strong correlation with LVV (r=0.83-0.84) and LVV to supratentorial volume ratio (r=0.86-0.90).
• Frontal-Occipital Horn Ratio (FOHR) showed moderate correlation (r=0.68-0.74) and was normally distributed around 0.37.
• Evans' ratio (ER) exhibited moderate correlation (r=0.57-0.65) and was normally distributed around 0.25, with slight variations based on sex.

Conclusions:

• The anteroposterior lateral ventricle index (ALVI) shows significant potential for clinical application due to its strong correlation with LVV.
• Both FOHR and ER provide moderate correlations with LVV, offering valuable clinical insights.
• Defined reference values for linear estimates of ventricular volume can assist clinicians in identifying pathological ventriculomegaly.