Secretin-Enhanced Magnetic Resonance Cholangiopancreatography - A Reliable Approach to Assess Exocrine Pancreatic Function?

Objectives: To investigate the relation between exocrine pancreatic function and secretin-stimulated magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography (sMRCP) fluid volumes and its concordance to pancreatic elastase using a case-control approach. Methods: Navigator-triggered T2-weighted 3D-turbo-spin-echo sMRCP was performed on a 1·5-T-system in 977 subjects including volunteers without a history of pancreatitis (group: A n=917) and chronic pancreatic disorder patients without (group: B, n=32) and with diagnosis of exocrine pancreatic insufficiency (EPI) (group: C, n=28). After intravenous administration of 1 unit/kg secretin duodenal filling was graded (0-3) and quantified as sMRCP fluid volume. According to pancreatic elastase ELISA subjects were grouped as severe (<100 μg/g) and moderate (100-200 μg/g) pancreatic elastase insufficiency (PEI). Statistic evaluation comprised Kruskal-Wallis Test, multinomial logistic, linear regression and area-under-the-curve (AUC) analysis. Findings: sMRCP fluid volume was lower in patients with pancreatic disorders compared to controls (P=0·001), but independent of the presence of PEI. The odds ratio of a reduced grading of duodenal filling was higher in patients with EPI (group: C compared to controls) (P=0·001) but not significantly different between controls and patients without EPI (group: B P=0·911) or between both patient groups (group: B versus group: C P=0·059). There was only a small association of sMRCP fluid volume with pancreatic elastase (R2=0·04,P=0·001). AUCs of sMRCP fluid volume were 0·967 (95%CI 0·950-0·985) to detect EPI and 0·581 (95% CI 0·471-0·691) to detect severe PEI. Interpretation: Static sMRCP allows assessment of exocrine pancreatic function and can differentiate patients with diagnosis of EPI from volunteers, but is not suitable for screening of patients with PEI because of its discordance to pancreatic elastase. Funding Statement: The work is part of the Community Medicine Research net, which was funded by following institutions: Federal Ministry of Education and Research (grants 01ZZ9603, 01ZZ0103, 01ZZ0403, 01ZZ0701, 03ZIK012), Ministry of Cultural Affairs as well as the Social Ministry of the Federal State of Mecklenburg-West Pomerania, Federal Ministry of Nutrition, Agriculture and Consumer’s Safety (07HS003), German Research Foundation (projects Gr 1912/5-1, Ko 799/5-1, Vo 955/5-1, Vo 955/6-1, Vo 955/10-1), Competence Network Heart Failure (01GI0205), Competence Network Diabetes (01GI0855), German Asthma and COPD Network (COSYCONET; BMBF 01GI0883), Genopathomik (BMBF FZK 03138010), Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach Foundation, Alexander v. Humboldt Foundation, Leibniz Society, Siemens AG, Health Care Sector (Erlangen, Germany), Pfizer Pharma GmbH (SBU Endocrinology and Ophthalmology; Berlin Germany), Novo Nordisk (Mainz, Germany), Data Input GmbH (Darmstadt, Germany), GABA International AG (Therwil, Switzerland), Imedos Systems (Jena, Germany) and Heinen and Lowenstein (Bad Ems, Germany). Declaration of Interests: There are no conflicts of financial interest. Ethics Approval Statement: The local ethics committee approved the SHIP study, and written informed consent was obtained from all participating subjects before study inclusion.