Rapid MR imaging of the liver: comparison of twelve techniques for single breath-hold whole volume acquisition

Twelve magnetic resonance imaging pulse sequences for single breath-hold whole volume acquisition of the liver were evaluated on volunteers. Liver and spleen contrast to noise ratio (C/N), overall image quality, and grade of artifacts were compared. The 12 sequences included T2-weighted fast spin echo (FSE) with or without fat suppression (FS), fast multiplanar spoiled gradient recalled imaging (FMPSPGR), fast gradient recalled imaging without preparation pulses (FGR), FGR with inversion recovery preparation pulse nulling the liver or fat (IR-FGR-L and IR-FGR-F), FGR with driven equilibrium preparation pulse (DE-FGR), single shot moderately or heavily T2-weighted spin echo echo planar imaging (SE-EPI-mT2 and SE-EPI-hT2), multi-shot moderately T2-weighted spin echo echo planar imaging (multi-shot SE-EPI-mT2), inversion recovery EPI, and gradient echo EPI. In the quantitative analysis, FSE + FS showed a significantly higher C/N ratio than the others (p < 0.05). In the qualitative evaluation, DE-prepFGR, and single and multi-shot SE-EPI-mT2 had good results, as did FSE and FSE + FS. Further studies should be conducted to determine whether or not these breath-hold sequences can obviate current conventional non-breath-hold sequences.