Normative Computed Tomography Angiography Values of the Aortic Root, Aorta and Aortic arch in Children.

PURPOSE: Normative values for intracardiac and extracardiac vascular structures help in understanding normal growth and changes over time in children; this normative data are not currently available for ECG-gated Computed Tomography Angiography (CTA). We sought to establish ECG-gated CTA derived normative values for the aortic root, aorta and aortic arch in children. METHODS AND RESULTS: Aortic root, ascending aorta, aortic arch, and descending aorta were measured in systole and diastole in 100 subjects who had ECG-gated CTA at our center between January 2015 through December 2020 and met our inclusion criteria. The allometric exponent (AE) for each parameter was derived, and the parameter/body surface area(AE) (BSA(AE)) was established using the previously described methods. Using this data, normalized mean, cross-sectional area, and standard deviation were calculated. Z-score curves were plotted in relation to the BSA for all measurements. CONCLUSION: Our study reports systolic and diastolic ECG-gated CTA Z-scores along with normative curves in relation to BSA for the aortic root, aorta and aortic arch in children.