Simultaneous Multi-Slice Acceleration for Free-Breathing Motion Corrected Late Gadolinium Enhancement Imaging

Area of Science:

• Cardiovascular Imaging
• Magnetic Resonance Imaging
• Medical Technology

Background:

• Late gadolinium enhancement (LGE) MRI is crucial for assessing myocardial scar.
• Traditional LGE protocols can be time-consuming, limiting patient comfort and throughput.
• Accelerated imaging techniques are needed to improve efficiency in cardiac MRI.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and evaluate accelerated free-breathing motion corrected and averaged late gadolinium enhancement MRI (FB PSIR-MoCo LGE) protocols.
• To assess the feasibility of using simultaneous multi-slice (SMS) imaging to reduce acquisition time.
• To compare the diagnostic performance of SMS-accelerated LGE with a non-accelerated reference protocol.

Main Methods:

• Implemented simultaneous multi-slice (SMS) bSSFP imaging with GC-LOLA correction (multiband factor of two) into a FB PSIR-MoCo LGE sequence.
• Acquired two protocols in 26 patients: SMS-accelerated and non-SMS reference.
• Assessed myocardial sharpness, contrast-to-noise ratios (CNRs), and scar volume; image quality was rated on a 4-point scale.

Main Results:

• SMS acquisition reduced scan time by twofold (1.9 min vs. 3.7 min).
• Image quality scores were slightly reduced but remained good to excellent (3.46 vs. 3.64).
• Myocardial sharpness showed no significant difference; scar volume assessment showed excellent agreement (R²=0.996).

Conclusions:

• The SMS FB PSIR-MoCo LGE protocol effectively reduces scan time by 50% with minimal impact on image quality and myocardial sharpness.
• This accelerated protocol provides excellent agreement for myocardial scar assessment compared to the reference method.
• SMS acceleration represents a promising advancement for efficient cardiac MRI.