Quantitative Analysis of Pancreatic Fat in Children with Obesity Using Magnetic Resonance Imaging and Ultrasonography

Fig. 1. Example of fat quantification by ultrasonography and magnetic resonance imaging in an 11-year-old boy with obesity. (A) Fat fraction was obtained by drawing circular regions of interest (ROIs) within the pan-creas and liver on fat fraction images acquired using a three-dimensional multi-echo volumetric interpolated breath-hold examination (VIBE) Dixon sequence. (B) Transverse and (C) longitudinal ultrasonography images. Circular ROIs were drawn within the center of the pancreatic body, and elliptical ROIs were drawn within the perihepatic fat. The pancreato-perihepatic fat index was defined as (Pancreastransverse+Pancreaslongitudinal)/(Perihepatic fattransverse+Peripancreatic fatlongitudinal).

Fig. 2. Tukey's plot showing the mean±standard deviation for pancreatic fat fraction of the obesity and control groups. ***p<0.001.

Fig. 3. (A-C) Scatter plots and regression lines for the pancreatic fat fraction values versus (A) the body mass index (BMI) z-scores, (B) hepatic fat fraction values, and (C) pancreato-perihepatic fat index based on the subgroup analysis. Control group: full circles and dotted line. Obesity group: open circles and dashed line. All subjects: solid line.