Related Experiment Video
Updated: May 16, 2025

Identification of Disease-related Spatial Covariance Patterns using Neuroimaging Data
Published on: June 26, 2013
The statistical impact of ROI referencing on quantitative susceptibility mapping
Patrick S Fuchs1, Oliver C Kiersnowski1,2, Carlos Milovic3
1Department of Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering, University College London, London, UK.
Choosing a reference region in quantitative susceptibility mapping (QSM) impacts clinical findings and may introduce bias. Careful selection is crucial, as no single reference region is optimal for all studies.
Area of Science:
- Medical Imaging
- Neuroimaging
Background:
- Quantitative susceptibility mapping (QSM) reconstructs magnetic susceptibility values.
- Absolute referencing is not possible in QSM, necessitating relative referencing using anatomical regions of interest (ROIs).
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the theoretical basis and impact of referencing on statistical comparisons in QSM.
- To evaluate the effect of reference region selection on clinical findings and statistical significance.
Main Methods:
- Analysis of a clinical epilepsy study dataset.
- Evaluation of in-silico QSM reconstruction challenge data.
- Investigation of various reference regions and their impact on statistical variations.
Main Results:
- Referencing significantly impacts the statistical significance of clinical findings in QSM.
- Referencing can alter the precision of test statistics and potentially bias results.
- No single "optimal" reference region exists; selection depends on pathology and cohort.
Conclusions:
- Careful consideration of reference region selection is essential in QSM, especially for clinical applications.
- Avoiding explicit referencing or "cherry-picking" reference regions reduces the risk of false positives.
- Publishing QSM results with their reference region is recommended for dataset comparability.
More Related Videos
12:08Rapid Antimicrobial Susceptibility Testing by Stimulated Raman Scattering Imaging of Deuterium Incorporation in a Single Bacterium
Published on: February 14, 2022
09:19Spatial Profiling of Protein and RNA Expression in Tissue: An Approach to Fine-Tune Virtual Microdissection
Published on: July 6, 2022
Related Concept Videos
Types of Biopharmaceutical Studies: Controlled and Non-Controlled Approaches
Non-controlled studies, commonly employed for initial exploration, lack a control group, rendering them susceptible to biases and external influences. In contrast,...
Relative Risk
Receiver Operating Characteristic Plot