Normal Liver Stiffness by MR Elastography

Healthy children will be recruited to under Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI)along with MR elastography to determine normal liver stiffness values.

MR elastography (MRE) is playing a growing role in the non-invasive diagnosis and monitoring of liver disease in the pediatric population. There is, however, little data specific to the use of this technique in children with existing data and techniques largely extrapolated from adult studies. Existing studies suggest that liver stiffness values may be different between children and adults \[Etchell, Xanthakos\]. As such there is an unmet need for uniquely pediatric data in both healthy and diseased cohorts. To address the need for such data, the investigators plan a multi-site, prospective study of healthy pediatric (\<18 years of age) volunteers to determine normal liver stiffness measured by MR elastography across the range of MRI equipment.