Quantification of Cerebral Perfusion using Laser Speckle Imaging and Infarct Volume using MRI in a Pre-clinical Model of Posterior Circulation Stroke

Background: Basilar artery occlusion (BAO) is a subset of posterior circulation stroke that carries a mortality as high as 90%.  The current clinical standard to diagnose ischemic stroke include computerized tomography (CT), CT angiography and perfusion and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Large animal pre-clinical models to accurately reflect the clinical disease as well as methods to assess stroke burden and evaluate treatments are lacking.

Methods: We describe a canine model of large vessel occlusion (LVO) stroke in the posterior circulation, and developed a laser speckle imaging (LSI) protocol to monitor perfusion changes in real time.  We then utilized high b-value DWI (b=1800s/mm²) MRI to increase detection sensitivity. We also evaluated the ability of magnetic resonance angiography (MRA) to assess arterial occlusion and correlate with DSA. Finally, we verified infarct size from apparent diffusion coefficient (ADC) mapping with histology. 

Results:  Administration of thromboembolism occluded the basilar artery as tracked by DSA (n=7).   LSI correlated with DSA, demonstrating a reduction in perfusion after stroke onset that persisted throughout the experiment, allowing us to monitor perfusion in real time.  DWI with an optimized b-value for dogs illustrated the stroke volume and allowed us to derive ADC and magnetic resonance angiography (MRA) images. The MRA performed at the end of the experiment correlated with DSA performed after occlusion. Finally, stroke burden on MRI correlated with histology.

Conclusions: Our studies demonstrate real time perfusion imaging using LSI of a canine thromboembolic LVO model of posterior circulation stroke, which utilizes multimodal imaging important in the diagnosis and treatment of ischemic stroke.