Increased volume of coverage for abdominal contrast-enhanced MR angiography with two-dimensional autocalibrating parallel imaging: Initial experience at 3.0 Tesla

✍ Scribed by Darren P. Lum; Reed F. Busse; Christopher J. Francois; Anja C. Brau; Philip J. Beatty; Joshua Huff; Jean H. Brittain; Scott B. Reeder

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2009
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 333 KB
• Volume: 30
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1053-1807
• DOI: 10.1002/jmri.21964

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

Purpose:

To assess the feasibility and the quality of abdominal three‐dimensional (3D) contrast enhanced MR angiograms acquired at 3.0 Tesla (T) using a new 2D‐accelerated autocalibrating parallel reconstruction method for Cartesian sampling (2D‐ARC).

Materials and Methods:

With institutional review board approval and written informed consent, a prospective trial in 6 normal healthy volunteers and 23 patients referred for evaluation of suspected renovascular disease was performed. The volunteers underwent abdominal MRA with and without 2D‐ARC acceleration. Images were evaluated independently by two blinded vascular radiologists in randomized order. Vessel conspicuity was rated on a five‐point scale. Evaluation for significant differences between the scores for each technique was performed using a Wilcoxon signed‐rank test.

Results:

In the series of six volunteers, no statistical significance was found between the image quality scores for 2D‐ARC accelerated and nonaccelerated exams. A high proportion of the 23 clinical 2D‐ARC exams were graded as diagnostic (vessel conspicuity score ≥2; Reader 1, 96%; Reader 2, 100%) for overall image quality.

Conclusion:

Subjective image quality of 2D‐ARC accelerated MRA was equivalent to the conventional MRA method. However, the 2D‐ARC accelerated sequence provided a 3.5‐fold increase in imaging volume, complete abdominal coverage, and a 30% reduction in voxel volume, all within the same acquisition time. J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2009;30:1093–1100. © 2009 Wiley‐Liss, Inc.