Optimal cardiac phase selection using motion-sensitive cine imaging improves T2w-STIR image quality in cardiac MRI.

OBJECTIVE

Cardiac T2-weighted short-tau inversion recovery (T2w-STIR) is highly susceptible to myocardial motion, and acquisition at inappropriate cardiac phases can cause myocardial signal loss and inhomogeneity. This study investigated whether cardiac phase selection based on motion-sensitive (MoSe) cine imaging improves T2w-STIR image quality compared with conventional ECG-synchronized acquisition at the longest trigger delay corresponding to end-diastole.

MATERIALS AND

METHODS

Twelve healthy volunteers underwent 1.5T cardiac MRI. MoSe cine imaging with ECG and peripheral pulse unit (PPU) synchronization was used to visually identify phases with minimal myocardial motion. Short-axis T2w-STIR images were acquired at Conv[ECG-l] (longest ECG trigger delay at end-diastole), MoSe[ECG-S] (MoSe-determined systolic phase with ECG), and MoSe[PPU-D] (MoSe-determined diastolic phase with PPU). Quantitative assessments were myocardium-to-spleen ratio (MSR) and inter- and intra-slice MSR coefficient of variation (CV). Overall image quality was scored on a 4-point scale.

RESULTS

MoSe[PPU-D] yielded higher MSR and lower inter- and intra-slice CVs than Conv[ECG-l] (p < 0.05), and higher MSR and lower intra-slice CV than MoSe[ECG-S] (p < 0.05). Qualitative scores were higher for MoSe[PPU-D] than for Conv[ECG-l] and MoSe[ECG-S] (p < 0.05).

CONCLUSION

Cardiac T2w-STIR images acquired at the MoSe-identified optimal diastolic phase with PPU synchronization provide superior image quality compared with conventional ECG-synchronized approach.