Can Portable Low-Field MRI Facilitate Viable Triage and Health Equity for Patients with Suspected Alzheimer’s Disease?

Access to magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) facilities is a significant challenge for many patients with suspected Alzheimer’s disease who may be viable candidates for newer anti-amyloid therapies, noted Tammie Benzinger, M.D., Ph.D., in a recent Diagnostic Imaging interview.

While noting that she works within a network of facilities spread out over a five-hour driving radius, Dr. Benzinger said some patients may live two or three hours away from the closest facility.

“We've been working really hard to think about how we can meet patients where they are. How can we deliver what can be a life-changing health-care option for them in a way that lets them go on living their everyday life?,” posited Dr. Benzinger, the Hugh Monroe Wilson Professor of Radiology and chief of the MRI service with the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology and the Washington University School of Medicine. “You can imagine if you lived two or four hours or even more away from (a) university hospital, you're not going to come here twice a month for an infusion and once a month for a brain MRI. It’s just too much. So, we've been working on accessible options.”

Enter portable low-field MRI at stage left. In recent research presented at the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference (AAIC), Dr. Benzinger and her colleagues found that portable low-field MRI (Swoop Portable MR Imaging, Hyperfine) was effective at automated brain segmentation in detecting normal pressure hydrocephalus, a common cause of dementia, and in segmenting white matter hyperintensity that may be more suggestive of chronic small vessel ischemia related to high blood pressure, diabetes or kidney failure.

Dr. Benzinger suggested that portable low-field MRI at rural facilities can help rule out Alzheimer’s disease in these cases or demonstrate findings that may lead to subsequent use of 3T MRI to determine whether patients are viable candidates for anti-amyloid treatments.

“With this model, we can expedite access to therapy by identifying the best candidates out in the community, close to home, and then referring just those candidates that need this additional MRI evaluation to that 3T MRI center. So that's that baseline triage, chopping down this wait list for getting to therapy,” emphasized Dr. Benzinger, a professor of neurological surgery, biology and biological science at the Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology in St. Louis.

(Editor’s note: For related content, see “FDA Clears Next-Generation AI Software for Portable Brain MRI,” “Can Deep Learning Enhance Low-Field MRI for Multiple Sclerosis Assessment?” and “What a New MRI Meta-Analysis Reveals About AI-Powered Hippocampal Segmentation and Alzheimer’s Disease.”)

For more insights from Dr. Benzinger, watch the video below.