Quantitative measurement of atheroma burden: reproducibility in serial studies of atherosclerotic femoral arteries

Objectives This study aims to evaluate the reproducibility of measures of plaque morphology in serially acquired black-blood MRI of untreated atherosclerotic femoral arteries. Materials and methods MR studies was obtained from 42 timepoints, on 12 patients with known femoral artery atherosclerosis. Images with a 3D isotropic FLASH with DANTE-prepared black blood contrast (DASH) at a 3-T scanner were acquired at baseline, within 1 week, and at 1 month. Six of the patients were scanned additionally at 6 months. Inter-scan and inter-observer variations of arterial area/volume measurements were evaluated. Results Measurement of vessel area, lumen area, wall area and wall volume showed inter-scan intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) ranging from 0.92 to 0.97 for 3 scans, 0.91–0.97 for 4 scans, and inter-observer ICCs of 0.89–0.96. Among 3 scans, the coefficients of variance (CV) for the vessel area, lumen area, wall area and wall volume were 4.1%, 6.5%, 7.5%, and 4.4%. CVs among 4 scans ranged from 4.4% to 7.9%, and interobserver CVs ranged from 6.1% to 11.8% for the different area/volume measurements. Conclusion DASH MRI is useful for quantifying atherosclerotic vessel area and volume of femoral arteries with low variability among serial repeated scans and between observers.