Feasibility of personalized rTMS targeting using rs-fMRI on a 0.5T head-only MRI scanner: initial assessment of target reproducibility

Motivation: Personalized rTMS treatment planning using a small footprint, 0.5T, head-specific, MRI system has the potential to increase access to improved treatment planning methodology. Goal(s): We want to determine if a head-only 0.5T scanner can be used to perform personalized rTMS target treatment planning? Approach: We ran novel multi-echo EPI scans repeatedly on 11 subjects over 2 days and processed data using free software to obtain functional connectivity maps using ICA. Results: This study shows that functional connectivity maps between two target regions can be obtained at 0.5T on a head-only scanner and that the results of the reproducibility of these maps is promising. Impact: This work may enable greater access to MRI-based personalized treatment planning for rTMS treatment of depression. We show that the required information is reliably obtained on a mid-field, head-only scanner which could be placed close to rTMS treatment sites.