ArticleEuropean radiology2020
Airway tapering: an objective image biomarker for bronchiectasis.
Article in European radiology, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 13 papers.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
13 citing papers in PubMed, 28 citations in OpenAlex.
- Radiomics of the Airway (RadAr): Multi-Scale Airway Phenotyping for Disease Characterization on Routine CT Imaging.medRxiv : the preprint server for health sciences · 2026Article
- Airway segmentation on CT - A systematic review of machine learning tools.European journal of radiology open · 2026Article
- Bronchiectasis in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease: AI-based CT quantification using the bronchial tapering ratio.European radiology · 2026Article
- Airway tapering in COPD.The European respiratory journal · 2024Article
- Children with severe asthma have substantial structural airway changes on computed tomography.ERJ open research · 2024Article
- ERS International Congress 2022: highlights from the Respiratory Infections Assembly.ERJ open research · 2023Article
- Observational
- Automated Detection of Broncho-Arterial Pairs Using CT Scans Employing Different Approaches to Classify Lung Diseases.Biomedicines · 2023Article
- The effect of CFTR modulators on structural lung disease in cystic fibrosis.Frontiers in pharmacology · 2023Article
- Automatic airway segmentation from computed tomography using robust and efficient 3-D convolutional neural networks.Scientific reports · 2021Article
- Novel imaging techniques for cystic fibrosis lung disease.Pediatric pulmonology · 2021Review
- Review
- The radiological diagnosis of bronchiectasis: what's in a name?European respiratory review : an official journal of the European Respiratory Society · 2020Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
5 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
Abstract
purposeTo estimate airway tapering in control subjects and to assess the usability of tapering as a bronchiectasis biomarker in paediatric populations.
methodsAirway tapering values were semi-automatically quantified in 156 children with control CTs collected in the Normal Chest CT Study Group. Airway tapering as a biomarker for bronchiectasis was assessed on spirometer-guided inspiratory CTs from 12 patients with bronchiectasis and 12 age- and sex-matched controls. Semi-automatic image analysis software was used to quantify intra-branch tapering (reduction in airway diameter along the branch), inter-branch tapering (reduction in airway diameter before and after bifurcation) and airway-artery ratios on chest CTs. Biomarkers were further stratified in small, medium and large airways based on three equal groups of the accompanying vessel size.
resultsControl subjects showed intra-branch tapering of 1% and inter-branch tapering of 24-39%. Subjects with bronchiectasis showed significantly reduced intra-branch of 0.8% and inter-branch tapering of 19-32% and increased airway-artery ratios compared with controls (p < 0.01). Tapering measurements were significantly different between diseased and controls across all airway sizes. Difference in airway-artery ratio was only significant in small airways.
conclusionPaediatric normal values for airway tapering were established in control subjects. Tapering showed to be a promising biomarker for bronchiectasis as subjects with bronchiectasis show significantly less airway tapering across all airway sizes compared with controls. Detecting less tapering in larger airways could potentially lead to earlier diagnosis of bronchiectasis. Additionally, compared with the conventional airway-artery ratio, this novel biomarker has the advantage that it does not require pairing with pulmonary arteries. KEY POINTS: • Tapering is a promising objective image biomarker for bronchiectasis that can be extracted semi-automatically and has good correlation with validated visual scoring methods. • Less airway tapering was observed in patients with bronchiectasis and can be observed sensitively throughout the bronchial tree, even in the more central airways. • Tapering values seemed to be less influenced by variety in scanning protocols and lung volume making it a more robust biomarker for bronchiectasis detection.
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