Department of Radiology, Faculty of Medicine, Fukuoka University, 7-45-1 Nanakuma Jonan-ku, Fukuoka 814-0180, Japan.
Jpn J Radiol. 2013 May;31(5):336-41. doi: 10.1007/s11604-013-0195-7. Epub 2013 Mar 1.
To test inter- and intraobserver consistency of liver stiffness measurement on MR elastography (MRE) at 3.0 T.
Two abdominal radiologists independently measured stiffness of the liver on MRE in three volunteers and seven patients with chronic liver diseases using three different region-of-interest (ROI) placement methods. Methods 1 and 2 involved placing circular and free-hand-drawn ROIs, respectively, visually referring to anatomical (three-dimensional T1-weighted) and wave images. Method 3 involved placing ROIs on the fused images of MRE and anatomical images developed on a work station, visually referring to wave images. The inter- and intraobserver consistency was assessed with regression and Bland-Altman analysis.
Thirty-eight images were available for measurement in total. As for interobserver consistency, method 3 showed the best regression coefficient, correlation coefficient, and y intercept. The absolute values of the interobserver differences for method 3 were significantly smaller than those of method 1 or method 2 (p < 0.05, each). Intraobserver consistency of method 3 was excellent for both observers.
Stiffness measurement of the liver on MRE performed with the fusion method at 3.0 T provides the highest inter- and intraobserver consistency.
测试 3.0T 磁共振弹性成像（MRE）上肝硬度测量的观察者间和观察者内一致性。
两名腹部放射科医生分别使用三种不同的感兴趣区（ROI）放置方法，在三名志愿者和七名慢性肝病患者的 MRE 上独立测量肝脏的硬度。方法 1 和 2 分别涉及使用圆形和徒手绘制的 ROI，通过参考三维 T1 加权和波图像进行视觉定位。方法 3 涉及在工作站上开发的 MRE 和解剖图像的融合图像上放置 ROI，通过参考波图像进行视觉定位。通过回归和 Bland-Altman 分析评估观察者间和观察者内的一致性。
总共可用于测量的图像有 38 张。在观察者间一致性方面，方法 3 显示出最佳的回归系数、相关系数和 y 截距。方法 3 的观察者间差异的绝对值明显小于方法 1 或方法 2（p < 0.05，每次）。对于两名观察者，方法 3 的观察者内一致性均非常好。
在 3.0T 下使用融合方法进行 MRE 肝脏硬度测量可提供最高的观察者间和观察者内一致性。
