Analysis of Flow Vortices in the Pulmonary Artery of Healthy Normals and Patients with pH with 4D Flow MRI

Guilhem Jean Collier¹, Andy Swift¹, David Capener¹, David Kiely¹, Jim M. Wild¹

A 4D flow study was performed on a group of patients with pulmonary hypertension and healthy volunteers to assess the formation and existence of vortices in blood flow in the pulmonary artery. Contrary to the published data in the literature, our results show that vortices with back flow in the main pulmonary artery are present in a significant percentage of healthy subjects and that their relative period of existence is not a sensitive parameter for determining the degree of PH severity.