Rationale and Objectives
At present, there is no available method to study the in vivo microstructures of the airway wall (epithelium, smooth muscle, adventitia, basement
membrane, glands, cartilage). Currently, we rely on ex vivo histologic evaluation of airway biopsies. To overcome this obstacle, we have developed
an endoscopic ultrahigh-resolution diffractive optical coherence tomography (OCT)
system, operating at a wavelength of 800 nm, to non-invasively study the in vivo microstructures of the airway wall. Prior to human study, validation of diffractive
OCT's ability to quantitate airway microstructural components is required.
Materials and Methods
To validate and demonstrate the accuracy of this OCT system, we used an ovine model
to image small airways (∼ 2 mm in diameter). Histologic samples and correlated OCT
images were matched. The cross-sectional area of the airway wall, lumen, and other
microstructures were measured and compared.
Results
A total of 27 sheep were studied from which we identified 39 paired OCT–histology
airway images. We found strong correlations between the OCT and the histology measurements
of the airway wall area and the microstructural area measurements of the epithelium,
basement membrane, airway smooth muscle, glands, cartilage, and adventitia. The correlations
ranged from r=0.61 (p<0.001) for the epithelium to r=0.86 (p<0.001) for the adventitia with the correlation between the OCT and the histology
measurements for the entire airway wall of r=0.76 (p<0.001).
Conclusion
Given the high degree of correlation, these data validate the ability to acquire and
quantify in vivo microscopic level imaging with this newly developed 800nm ultra-high resolution diffractive
OCT system.
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Article info
Publication history
Published online: March 10, 2022
Accepted:
January 9,
2022
Received in revised form:
December 22,
2021
Received:
September 27,
2021
Identification
Copyright
© 2022 The Association of University Radiologists. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
