Saam T, Raya JG, Cyran CC, Bochmann K, Meimarakis G, Dietrich O, Clevert DA, Frey U, Yuan C, Hatsukami TS, Werf A, Reiser MF, Nikolaou K
High resolution carotid black-blood 3T MR with parallel imaging and dedicated 4-channel surface coils. [JOURNAL ARTICLE]
J Cardiovasc Magn Reson 2009 Oct 27; 11(1):41.
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND: Most of the carotid plaque MR studies have been performed using black-blood protocols at 1.5T without parallel imaging techniques. The purpose of this study was to evaluate a multi-sequence, black-blood MR protocol using parallel imaging and a dedicated 4-channel surface coil for vessel wall imaging of the carotid arteries at 3T. Material &
Methods: 14 healthy volunteers and 14 patients with intimal thickening as proven by duplex ultrasound had their carotid arteries imaged at 3T using a multi-sequence protocol (time-of-flight MR angiography, pre-contrast T1w-, PDw- and T2w sequences in the volunteers, additional post-contrast T1w- and dynamic contrast enhanced sequences in patients). To assess intrascan reproducibility, 10 volunteers were scanned twice within 2 weeks.
RESULTS: Intrascan reproducibility for quantitative measurements of lumen, wall and outer wall areas was excellent with Intraclass Correlation Coefficients >0.98 and measurement errors of 1.5%, 4.5% and 1.9%, respectively. Patients had larger wall areas than volunteers in both common carotid and internal carotid arteries and smaller lumen areas in internal carotid arteries (p<0.001). Positive correlations were found between wall area and cardiovascular risk factors such as age, hypertension, coronary heart disease and hypercholesterolemia (Spearman's r=0.45-0.76, p<0.05). No significant correlations were found between wall area and body mass index, gender, diabetes or a family history of cardiovascular disease.
CONCLUSION: The findings of this study indicate that high resolution carotid black-blood 3T MR with parallel imaging is a fast, reproducible and robust method to assess carotid atherosclerotic plaque in vivo and this method is ready to be used in clinical practice.
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