Three-dimensional first-pass myocardial perfusion MRI using a stack-of-spirals acquisition

Area of Science:

• Cardiovascular imaging
• Magnetic resonance imaging
• Medical physics

Background:

• Three-dimensional (3D) cardiac magnetic resonance (MR) perfusion imaging shows potential for accurate defect sizing and high perfusion contrast.
• Traditional 3D MR imaging faces challenges with large-dimensional encoding, requiring high acceleration factors or reduced spatial resolution.
• This limits its clinical application, despite its promise.

Purpose of the Study:

• To demonstrate the feasibility of rapid 3D cardiac MR perfusion imaging.
• To overcome limitations of traditional 3D imaging techniques.
• To achieve whole-heart coverage with high in-plane resolution.

Main Methods:

• Utilized a stack-of-spirals acquisition accelerated by non-Cartesian k-t SENSE.
• Employed an optimal undersampling pattern for signal separation.
• Optimized flip angle and saturation recovery time for transient data acquisition.
• Compared the 3D method with standard 2D fast Fourier Transform (2DFT) imaging in cardiac patients.

Main Results:

• Achieved entire myocardial coverage with 2.4 mm in-plane resolution.
• Demonstrated strong correlation between 3D and 2DFT time intensity curves (mean r=0.94, SD=0.06).
• Found a significant linear correlation between upslope values from both methods (r=0.78, P<0.05).

Conclusions:

• Rapid 3D cardiac MR perfusion imaging using stack-of-spirals and k-t SENSE is feasible.
• The proposed method provides comparable results to standard 2DFT techniques.
• This technique holds promise for improved cardiac imaging and diagnosis.