Abstract
A versatile ventilator for controlling a patient’s breath cycle and dosing 3He gas has been designed and constructed. It is compatible with a medical magnetic resonance imaging scanner and can be incorporated into routine human lungs imaging procedure that employs hyperpolarized noble gas as a contrast agent. The system adapts to the patient’s lung volume and their breath cycle rhythm, providing maximum achievable comfort during the medical examination. Good quality magnetic resonance lung images of healthy volunteers were obtained. The system has the capability of recycling the exhaled gas to recover the expensive 3He isotope, and can be also adapted to human lung imaging with hyperpolarized 129Xe.
Highlights
In recent years, novel magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques using hyperpolarized (HP)gases as imaging agents for in-vivo imaging of human lungs have been developed [1]
The performance of the ventilator has been assessed by integrating it with the 1.5T Siemens Avanto MRI medical scanner and the high field 3 He MEOP polarizer that operates inside the MRI magnet bore [23]
A set of sterile breathing tubes with the mouthpiece (A) connect the system to the patient, who is able to manipulate them by himself, to achieve the most comfortable position in the scanner. We found it more convenient than the direct application of the Tedlar bag filled with the noble gas
Summary
Novel magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) techniques using hyperpolarized (HP). In the case of children, critical care patients, or those requiring permanent mechanical ventilation, the breath control and the sequence triggering may be still necessary to obtain good image quality For such applications, the standard ventilators were modified by extending the gas delivery tubes that connect the main unit located outside the Faraday cage to the patient [12]. In-vivo MR images of human lungs were acquired in 1996, with the application of hyperpolarized 3 He [16,17] These results opened new possibilities for the application of the technique in medical diagnostics, and stimulated the development of dedicated ventilators with the noble gas administration capability. The performance of the ventilator has been assessed by integrating it with the 1.5T Siemens Avanto MRI medical scanner and the high field 3 He MEOP (metastability exchange optical pumping) polarizer that operates inside the MRI magnet bore [23]
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