Three-dimensional monitoring of small temperature changes for therapeutic hyperthermia using MR

Radiofrequency hyperthermia of deep-seated pelvic tumors requires noninvasive monitoring of temperature distributions in patients. Methods of MR thermography were reported to be a promising tool in solving this problem. However, to be truly useful for monitoring hyperthermia treatments, MR thermography should be able to cover the entire pelvis in acquisition times no longer than for a breath-hold (< or = 15 seconds) and to resolve small temperature differences (< 1 degrees C). Three methods exploiting the temperature dependence of spin-lattice relaxation time (T1), of self-diffusion coefficient (D), and of chemical shift of proton resonance frequency (PRF) were applied in phantom experiments; the pulse sequences were the T1-weighted gradient echo, the pulsed diffusion gradient spin echo made faster through the keyhole technique, and the gradient echo with the phase reconstruction, respectively. The high planar resolution was compromised, and instead, coarse and more isotropic voxels were used. Experiments were performed in two consecutive steps, thus imitating a possible scenario for monitoring hyperthermia. In the first step, calibration curves were recorded, which were then used in the second step to obtain maps of temperature changes. The results show a clear superiority of the PRF method, followed by the D and the T1 methods. The uncertainty of temperature changes predicted both from calibration curves and from maps was less than 1 degrees C only with the PRF and the D-based methods.