Development of MRI-Guided Intrabiliary Local Agent Delivery Technique

Feng Zhang¹, Jiakai Li¹, Yanfeng Meng¹, Jihong Sun¹, Stephanie San Juan Soriano¹, Huidong Gu¹, Patrick Willis¹, Xiaoming Yang¹

This study was to develop a new technique of intrabiliary MRI-guided local agent delivery. We first confirmed the capability of motexafin gadolinium(MGd) entering cholangiocarcinoma cells. Then, we established surgical protocol for intrabiliary balloon-mediated MGd delivery into pig common bile duct (CBD) walls ex vivo. We finally validated the feasibility of using MR to monitor, in vivo, intrabiliary delivery of MGd into the pig CBD wall of a pig, which was confirmed by subsequent MRI-histology correlation. This new technique may open new revenues for MR-guided intrabiliary local delivery of therapeutics, such as genes and drugs, to treat malignant pancreatobiliary diseases.