Letter to the Editor: Acute extrahepatic infectious or inflammatory diseases are a cause of transient mosaic pattern on CT and MR imaging related to sinusoidal dilatation of the liver

We read with great interest the article by Ronot and colleagues in the recent issue of European Radiology about the transient mosaic pattern observed on computed tomography (CT) and magnetic resonance (MR) imaging in acute extrahepatic infection or inflammatory disease [1]. They demonstrated nicely that acute diseases of extrahepatic organs are associated with a reversible hepatic sinusoidal dilatation resulting in a mosaic enhancement pattern on contrast-enhanced CT or MR imaging. However, we were surprised that other hepatic imaging features such as periportal halo or gallbladder wall thickening were not mentioned. Basically, it is difficult to estimate the frequency of such hepatic abnormalities in patients with acute extrahepatic infections.