Marlies Oostendorp1,2, Eva E. de Vries1,3, L. W.E. van Heurn1,3, Walter H. Backes1,2
1Maastricht University Medical Centre, Maastricht, Netherlands; 2CARIM, Maastricht, Netherlands; 3NUTRIM, Maastricht, Netherlands
A common problem of kidney transplantation is that kidneys are damaged due to a period of ischemia between death of the donor and kidney cooling. Novel therapies are being developed to limit renal ischemia-reperfusion injury and improve the clinical outcome of kidney transplants. However, to fully assess their therapeutic efficacy, new non-invasive imaging methods are required. Here, we describe the application of Dynamic Contrast Enhanced MRI using the separable compartment model in combination with a reference region input function, to assess kidney function in a mouse model of renal ischemia-reperfusion injury.