MRI Evaluation of hepatic iron overload in chronically transfused β-Thalassemic Children

Abstract

ur Study was carried out upon 45 multi-transfused β-thalassemia major children. These thalassemic children were selected from those attending for a medical check up at the Hematology Unit, Pediatric Department. And the study carried on the department of diagnostic radiology Ain Shams University. These 45 children were subjected to laboratory and MRI assessment. Our results showed that the larger the liver iron overload, the greater the decrease of signal intensity (SI) on MR images which is represented with T2* as liver parenchyma darkens progressively with increased echo time. Our study showed that there were significant negative correlation between LIC and T2* and significant positive correlation between LIC and R2*.