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MRI Long Covid Study Reveals Link Between Lower Pulmonary Gas Exchange and Cognitive Dysfunction
For patients with Long Covid, lower pulmonary gas exchange may be associated with lower gray and white matter volume, according to new MRI research to be presented at the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) conference.
In what may be the first magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) study to examine pulmonary and cognitive effects of Long Covid, researchers said that preliminary findings demonstrate a possible link between cognitive dysfunction and lower pulmonary gas exchange.
For the study, which will be presented at the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) conference, researchers reviewed data from hyperpolarized 129Xe pulmonary MRI as well as structural and functional brain MRI for 11 people who had persistent dyspnea and/or fatigue 31 months after acute COVID-19 infection.1
The study authors found that lower pulmonary gas exchange was associated with lower cerebral and parietal lobe white matter, and lower frontal lobe gray matter.
Here one can examples of low pulmonary gas exchange and a brain MRI (inset image) for a patient with Long Covid. New MRI research suggests that lower pulmonary gas exchange is associated with lower gray and white matter volume in patients with Long Covid. (Images courtesy of RSNA.)
The use of hyperpolarized 129Xe pulmonary MRI was particularly beneficial in this patient population, according to the researchers.
"129Xe MRI allows for advanced measurements of ventilation and gas exchange," noted lead study author Keegan Staab, B.S., a graduate research assistant affiliated with the Department of Radiology at the University of Iowa in Iowa City, Iowa. "The literature also indicates that 129Xe may be more sensitive to pulmonary injury compared to standard breathing tests, making it better suited to study long COVID in which patients typically have normal breathing tests."
(Editor’s note: For additional coverage of RSNA, click here.)
The researchers also uncovered a correlation between lower pulmonary gas exchange and higher cerebral blood flow but cautioned that larger studies are needed for further exploration of this association.
"This relationship could be a compensatory mechanism where lower lung function is compensated by higher cardiac output and higher brain perfusion," posited Stabb. "It's also a possibility that the disease mechanism that impairs pulmonary gas exchange also leads to higher brain perfusion through downstream vascular injury in both lung and brain."
Reference
1. Stabb K, McIntosh M, Percy J. Xenon-129 MRI pulmonary gas exchange in long Covid is associated with cognitive function and brain MRI. Poster to be presented at the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) 2024 110th Scientific Assembly and Annual Meeting Dec. 1-5, 2024. Available at: https://www.rsna.org/annual-meeting .
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