Motivation: Conducting 129Xe ventilation MRI across different imaging centers requires refined methods of bias field correction to reduce variability between images. Goal(s): To compare standardized 129Xe MRI ventilation healthy reference values generated with different bias field correction methods using a reader study. Approach: Six expert readers evaluated 133 subjects (57 healthy from 3 sites) processed with three different healthy reference distributions, including one utilizing multi-step bias field correction. The order of the methods was randomized to ensure blinding. Results: A multi-step bias field correction demonstrated superior performance with the highest perfect score rates, especially in addressing apical-basal gradient inhomogeneities across sites. Impact: This study provides valuable insights into the effectiveness of different bias field correction methods in reducing variability and improving quantification accuracy in 129Xe ventilation MRI across multiple imaging centers.
Leewiwatwong et al. (Tue,) studied this question.