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Free-breathing slice-interleaved myocardial T2 mapping with slice-selective T2 magnetization preparation
Tamer A Basha1,2, Steven Bellm1, Sébastien Roujol1
1Cardiovascular Division, Department of Medicine, Beth Israel Deaconess, Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts, USA.
Magnetic Resonance in Medicine
|October 20, 2015
Summary
A new free-breathing T2 mapping sequence enables faster myocardial T2 measurements. This advanced technique offers similar accuracy and precision to existing methods but reduces acquisition time by four-fold, improving efficiency for cardiovascular imaging.
Area of Science:
- Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance Imaging
- Quantitative MRI Techniques
Background:
- Myocardial T2 mapping is crucial for assessing tissue characteristics in cardiovascular disease.
- Conventional T2 mapping sequences can be time-consuming, limiting their clinical applicability.
- Free-breathing techniques are desirable to reduce motion artifacts and improve patient comfort.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop and evaluate a novel free-breathing, slice-interleaved T2 mapping sequence.
- To assess the accuracy, precision, and reproducibility of the proposed sequence compared to conventional methods.
- To evaluate the feasibility and image quality of the sequence in patients with cardiovascular disease.
Main Methods:
- A slice-selective T2 preparation (T2 prep) sequence was developed for interleaved slice acquisition.
- Five left ventricular slices were acquired over five heartbeats per T2 prep echo time.
- Phantom and in vivo studies in healthy subjects and patients were conducted, comparing the proposed sequence with a single-slice T2 mapping sequence.
Main Results:
- The slice-interleaved T2 mapping sequence showed high correlation with spin echo (r²=0.88) and single-slice T2 mapping (r²=0.98).
- Mean myocardial T2 values were comparable between the slice-interleaved (48 ms) and single-slice (51 ms) sequences.
- Good to excellent subjective map quality was achieved in 81% of patient cases, with no significant impact of through-plane motion.
Conclusions:
- The proposed free-breathing slice-interleaved T2 mapping sequence enables efficient T2 measurements of multiple myocardial slices.
- The sequence achieves similar reproducibility and precision to single-slice methods but with a four-fold reduction in acquisition time.
- This technique holds promise for faster and more robust cardiovascular magnetic resonance imaging.
