Ning Jin1,2, Jie Deng1,3, Tamuna Chadashvili4, Yue Zhang4,5, Yang Guo4, Guangyu Yang6, Reed Omary2,4, Andrew C. Larson1,2
1Department of Radiology , Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, USA; 2Department of Biomedical Engineering, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, USA; 3Department of Medical Imaging, Children's Memorial Hospital, Chicago, IL, USA; 4Department of Radiology, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, USA; 5Department of Bioengineering, University of Illinois Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA; 6Department of Pathology, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, USA
Hepatic fibrosis is a dynamic and reversible process leading to regional and global blood perfusion alteration. We hypothesis that in the setting of liver fibrosis BOLD signal changes between normal and hyperoxia conditions would be reduced. In this work, a negative correlation was found between the BOLD response to gas-challenge and the degree of liver fibrosis. Gas-challenge BOLD MRI is a potential non-invasive method for liver fibrosis diagnosis and staging.