Methods to Detect Liver Fibrosis

While liver biopsy is still considered the gold standard for diagnosing and assessing the presence and degree of liver fibrosis and inflammation, it has disadvantages including the potential for sampling error and risk of complications, including life-threatening bleeding. New imaging modalities such as MR Elastography, T1 mapping, T2 mapping, T1 rho, and magnetization transfer allow rapid, non-invasive evaluation of liver parenchymal characteristics and may be able to detect and quantify parenchymal fibrosis alleviating the need for biopsy. To date, the quantitative performance of these different techniques has not been extensively studied. This study is a single-center trial of non-invasive MR imaging techniques aimed at detecting and measuring liver fibrosis. Once optimized, these technologies may later be deployed in hypothesis driven research studies and/or routine clinical exams in the pediatric population here at CCHMC and/or as part of a multi-center study with specific IRB approval for that project. To assess the relative performance of each technique, correlation across techniques, and reproducibility across the range of fibrosis, 32 subjects will be enrolled in this preliminary study sub-divided into 4 groups (Group 1: Healthy/ Normal controls; Group 2: F1/F2 fibrosis as determined by prior biopsy (low grade fibrosis group); Group 3: F3/F4 fibrosis as determined by prior biopsy (high grade fibrosis group), Group 4: Hepatic steatosis with fibrosis (NAFLD group)). 8 healthy subjects without known or suspected liver disease will be enrolled as normal controls. 8 subjects each with known fibrosis based on liver biopsy within the last 6 months will be enrolled in Group 2 and Group 3 (total = 16). 8 subjects with known hepatic steatosis and liver fibrosis based on liver biopsy within the last 6 months will be enrolled in Group 4.