Noninvasive Evaluation of Renal Oxygenation by BOLD-MRI - Comparison between Patients with Primary Aldosteronism and Healthy Controls

Motivation: To observe the renal oxygenation in patients with primary aldosteronism (PA). Goal(s): To explore the renal oxygenation in patients with PA by blood oxygenation level-dependent magnetic resonance imaging (BOLD-MRI) compared with healthy controls (HCs). Approach: A total of 40 participants were included and underwent renal BOLD-MRI. The correlation between renal BOLD parameters and clinical indicators was analyzed by Pearson correlation analysis or Spearman correlation analysis. A ROC curve was used to distinguish the PA patients and HCs. Results: The cortical R2* of the PA patients was higher than that of the HCs, suggesting that the cortices of PA patients were relative hypoxia. Impact: Our results suggested that BOLD-MRI could detect the oxygenation level of the renal cortex and medulla of PA patients and may have the potential to noninvasively assess renal status.