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Published on: December 15, 2014
Panoramic Magnetic Resonance Imaging of the Breast With a Wearable Coil Vest
Michael Obermann1, Lena Nohava, Roberta Frass-Kriegl
1From the High Field MR Center, Center for Medical Physics and Biomedical Engineering, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria (M.O., L.N., R.F.-K., O.S., E.L.); IADI, Université de Lorraine, Inserm, Nancy, France (L.N., J.F.); Laboratoire d'Imagerie Biomédicale Multimodale Paris Saclay (BioMaps), CEA, CNRS, Inserm, Université Paris-Saclay, Paris, France (J.-C.G.); and Department of Biomedical Imaging and Image-Guided Therapy, Division of General and Pediatric Radiology, Medical University of Vienna, Vienna, Austria (P.C., P.A.T.B.).
Background:
Breast cancer, the most common malignant cancer in women worldwide, is typically diagnosed by x-ray mammography, which is an unpleasant procedure, has low sensitivity in women with dense breasts, and involves ionizing radiation. Breast magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is the most sensitive imaging modality and works without ionizing radiation, but is currently constrained to the prone imaging position due to suboptimal hardware, therefore hampering the clinical workflow.
Objectives:
The aim of this work is to improve image quality in breast MRI, to simplify the clinical workflow, shorten measurement time, and achieve consistency in breast shape with other procedures such as ultrasound, surgery, and radiation therapy.
Materials And Methods:
To this end, we propose "panoramic breast MRI"-an approach combining a wearable radiofrequency coil for 3 T breast MRI (the "BraCoil"), acquisition in the supine position, and a panoramic visualization of the images. We demonstrate the potential of panoramic breast MRI in a pilot study on 12 healthy volunteers and 1 patient, and compare it to the state of the art.
Results:
With the BraCoil, we demonstrate up to 3-fold signal-to-noise ratio compared with clinical standard coils and acceleration factors up to 6 × 4. Panoramic visualization of supine breast images reduces the number of slices to be viewed by a factor of 2-4.
Conclusions:
Panoramic breast MRI allows for high-quality diagnostic imaging and facilitated correlation to other diagnostic and interventional procedures. The developed wearable radiofrequency coil in combination with dedicated image processing has the potential to improve patient comfort while enabling more time-efficient breast MRI compared with clinical coils.
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