Noninvasive assessment of clinical and pathological characteristics of patients with IgA nephropathy by diffusion kurtosis imaging

Abstract Objectives To explore the diagnostic performance of diffusion kurtosis imaging (DKI) in evaluating the clinical and pathological characteristics of patients with immunoglobulin A nephropathy (IgAN) compared with conventional DWI. Materials and methods A total of 28 IgAN patients and 14 healthy volunteers prospectively underwent MRI examinations including coronal T2WI, axial T1WI, T2WI, and DWI sequences from September 2020 to August 2021. We measured mean kurtosis (MK), mean diffusivity (MD), and apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) by using MR Body Diffusion Toolbox v1.4.0 (Siemens Healthcare). Patients were divided into three groups according to their estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) (Group1, healthy volunteers without kidney disease or other diseases that affect renal function; Group2, IgAN patients with eGFR > 60 mL/min/1.73 m2; Group3, IgAN patients with eGFR