Summary
The thorax (TH), the thoracic diaphragm (TD), and the abdominal wall (AW) are three
sub-systems of the respiratory apparatus whose displacement motion has been well studied
with the use of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Another sub-system, which has however
received less research attention with respect to breathing, is the pelvic floor (PF).
In particular, there is no study that has investigated the displacement of all four
sub-systems simultaneously. Addressing this issue, it was the purpose of this feasibility
study to establish a data acquisition paradigm for time-synchronous quantitative analysis
of dynamic MRI data from these four major contributors to respiration and phonation
(TH, TD, AW, and PF). Three healthy females were asked to breathe in and out forcefully
while being recorded in a 1.5-Tesla whole body MR-scanner. Spanning a sequence of
15.12 seconds, 40 MRI data frames were acquired. Each data frame contained two slices,
simultaneously documenting the mid-sagittal (TH, TD, PF) and transversal (AW) planes.
The displacement motion of the four anatomical structures of interest was documented
using kymographic analysis, resulting in time-varying calibrated structure displacement
data. After computing the fundamental frequency of the cyclical breathing motion,
the phase offsets of the TH, PF, and AW with respect to the TD were computed. Data
analysis revealed three fundamentally different displacement patterns. Total structure
displacement was in the range of 0.94 cm (TH) to 4.27 cm (TD). Phase delays of up
to 90 (i.e., a quarter of a breathing cycle) between different structures were found. Motion
offsets in the range of -28.30 to 14.90 were computed for the PF with respect to the TD. The diversity of results in only
three investigated participants suggests a variety of possible breathing strategies,
warranting further research.
Key Words
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: January 13, 2023
Accepted:
November 2,
2022
Publication stage
In Press Corrected ProofIdentification
Copyright
© 2022 Published by Elsevier Inc. on behalf of The Voice Foundation.
