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Noninvasive Quantification of Hepatic Arterial Blood Flow with Nitrogen-13-Ammonia and Dynamic Positron Emission Tomography

Division of Nuclear Medicine and Biophysics, Department of Radiological Sciences, UCLA School of Medicine, and Laboratory of Biomedical and Environmental Sciences, University of California, Los Angeles, California

Correspondence: For reprints contact: Benjamin C. Chen, MD, Creighton Center for Metabolic Imaging, 901 Dorcas St., Omaha, NE 68108.

ABSTRACT

To determine if dynamic PET and ¹³N-ammonia can be utilized to quantitate regional hepatic arterial blood flow (rHABF) noninvasively, eight anesthetized dogs and eight human volunteers were examined with PET following intravenous bolus administration of ¹³N-ammonia. Hepatic time-activity curves and the arterial input function were derived from ROIs drawn over the right lateral superior segment of the liver and the left ventricle of the heart, respectively. rHABF was quantitated using a two-compartment model, with comparison with simultaneously acquired microsphere blood flow measurement (MS) in the canine studies. rHABF derived from canine dynamic PET with ¹³N-ammonia were linearly related to microsphere values (rHABF= 0.92 x MS + 0.04, r = 0.98), with a mean of 0.40 ml/min/g. The results in eight normal volunteers gave a rHABF value of 0.26 ± 0.07 ml/min/g. Dynamic ¹³N-ammonia hepatic PET allows noninvasive quantification of rHABF.