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Black‐blood steady‐state free precession (SSFP) coronary wall MRI for cardiac allografts: A feasibility study
Author(s) -
Lin Kai,
Bi Xiaoming,
Liu Ying,
Taimen Kirsi,
Lu Biao,
Li Debiao,
Carr James
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
journal of magnetic resonance imaging
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.563
H-Index - 160
eISSN - 1522-2586
pISSN - 1053-1807
DOI - 10.1002/jmri.23543
Subject(s) - steady state free precession imaging , medicine , image quality , nuclear medicine , lumen (anatomy) , coronary artery disease , cardiology , artery , radiology , magnetic resonance imaging , artificial intelligence , computer science , image (mathematics)
Purpose: To assess the hypothesis that steady‐state free procession (SSFP) allows for imaging of the coronary wall under the conditions of fast heart rate in heart transplantation (HTx) patients. Materials and Methods: With the approval of our Institutional Review Board, 28 HTx patients were scanned with a 1.5T scanner. Cross‐sectional black‐blood images of the proximal portions of the left main artery, left anterior descending artery, and right coronary artery were acquired with both a 2D, double inversion recovery (DIR) prepared turbo (fast) spin echo (TSE) sequence and a 2D DIR SSFP sequence. Image quality (scored 0–3), vessel wall area, thickness, signal‐to‐noise ratio (SNR, vessel wall), and contrast‐to‐noise ratio (CNR, wall‐lumen) were compared between TSE and SSFP. Results: The overall image quality of SSFP was higher than TSE (1.23 ± 0.95 vs. 0.88 ± 0.69, P < 0.001). SSFP had a higher coronary wall SNR (20.1 ± 8.5 vs. 14.9 ± 4.8, P < 0.001) and wall‐lumen CNR (8.2 ± 4.6 vs. 6.8 ± 3.7, P = 0.005) than TSE. Conclusion: Black‐blood SSFP coronary wall MRI provides higher image quality, SNR, and CNR than traditional TSE does in HTx recipients. It has the potential to become an alternative means to noninvasive imaging of cardiac allografts. J. Magn. Reson. Imaging 2012;35:1210‐1215. © 2012 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.