Purpose: The diagnosis of progressive fibrosing interstitial lung disease (PF-ILD) using computed tomography (CT) is an important medical practice in respiratory care, and most imaging findings for this disease have been obtained with inspiratory CT. It is possible that some characteristic changes in respiration may be seen in normal and diseased lung in PF-ILD, which may lead to a new understanding of the pathogenesis of interstitial pneumonia, but it has never been examined. In this study, we collected and selected inspiratory and expiratory CT scans performed in pure PF-ILD cases, and evaluated the volumes of diseased and normal lung separately by manual detection and 3-dimensional volumetry to characterize the dynamic features of PF-ILD.
Materials and methods: Cases were collected retrospectively from a total of 753 inspiratory and expiratory CT scans performed at our hospital over a 3-year period. Sixteen cases of pure PF-ILD, excluding almost all other diseases, were included. We measured their diseased, normal, and the whole lung volumes manually and evaluated the correlation of their values and their relationship with respiratory function tests (FVC, FVC%-predicted, and DLCO%-predicted).
Results: The relative expansion rate of the diseased lung is no less than that of the normal lung. The "Expansion volume of total lung" divided by the "Expansion volume of normal lung" was found to be significantly associated with DLCO%-predicted abnormalities (p = 0.0073).
Conclusion: The diseased lung in PF-ILD retained expansion capacity comparable to the normal lung, suggesting a negative impact on respiratory function.
Keywords: Expiratory CT; Interstitial lung disease; Interstitial pneumonia; Respiratory function; Volumetric measurement.
© 2024. The Author(s).