Measurement of Pulmonary Arterial Impedance and Reflection from Single-slice Phase-Contrast and Steady-state Free Precession MRI

Pulmonary arterial hypertension (PAH) alters vessel wall mechanics and vasomotor tone, driving up pulmonary hemodynamic variables such as pulse wave velocity, input and characteristic impedance, and pulse wave reflection magnitude. Heterogeneous treatment response necessitates frequent hemodynamic evaluation, for which right-heart catheterization (RHC) remains the gold standard; however, several disadvantages limit its frequency of use. In this work, a non-invasive magnetic resonance (MR) imaging protocol is developed to address the shortcomings of invasive hemodynamic monitoring and may support existing diagnostic procedures. First, accuracy and precision of the proposed method is characterized through linear uncertainty propagation and numerical simulation of the data-processing pipeline. Second, the MR protocol is tested in seven healthy adult volunteers. Third, a rapid version of the MR protocol is tested in a healthy volunteer, yielding good agreement with mean values obtained in the seven-volunteer study.M.Sc