Quantification of ferritin iron in presence of hemosiderin

Abstract

Iron overload patients accumulate excess non-heme iron in the forms of both ferritin and hemosiderin. Due to its much better water solubility, ferritin iron may have different and likely greater clinical significance than hemosiderin. However, conventional methods to measure relaxation rates are unable to separate these two iron types. In this study, we propose a method for measuring a “reduced relaxation rate,” which should correlate strongly with ferritin but not hemosiderin. The validity and feasibility of the method is tested with a phantom in which MnCl2 is used to simulate ferritin and iron microspheres are used to simulate hemosiderin.