Effect of Blood Flow on Double Inversion Recovery Vessel Wall MRI of the Peripheral Arteries: Quantitation With T2 Mapping and Comparison With Flow-Insensitive T2-Prepared Inversion Recovery Imaging

Blood suppression in the lower extremities using flow-reliant methods such as double inversion recovery may be problematic due to slow blood flow. T-2 mapping using fast spin echo (FSE) acquisition was utilized to quantitate the effectiveness of double inversion recovery blood suppression in 13 subjects and showed that 25 +/- 12% of perceived vessel wall pixels in the popliteal arteries contained artifactual blood signal. To overcome this problem, a flow-insensitive T-2-prepared inversion recovery sequence was implemented and optimal timing parameters were calculated for FSE acquisition. Black blood vessel wall imaging of the popliteal and femoral arteries was performed using two-dimensional T-2-prepared inversion recovery-FSE in the same 13 subjects. Comparison with two-dimensional double inversion recovery-FSE showed that T-2-prepared inversion recovery-FSE reduced wall-mimicking blood artifacts that inflated double inversion recovery-FSE vessel wall area measurements in the popliteal artery. Magn Reson Med 63:736-744, 2010. (C) 2010 Wiley-Liss, Inc.