Influence of Preload and Post-Processing Methods on the Consistency of Cerebral Blood Volume Values from Dynamic Susceptibility Contrast MRI

With DSC-MRI, contrast agent leakage effects in high-grade gliomas must be resolved for accurate CBV measurements. Our aim is to compare CBV values across 1) varying preload doses, 2) two different previously published leakage correction methods, 3) normalized to either the AIF or normal appearing white matter (NAWM), and 4) different CBV integration limits. This was accomplished by acquiring six consecutive DSC-MRI with varying preloads in 14 glioma patients. We found that leakage corrected CBV measurements exhibit high consistency across variable preload doses, particularly when data is integrated under the “First Pass Only” and normalized to the AIF.