QUALITY ASSESSMENT IN IN-VIVO NMR-SPECTROSCOPY .5. MULTICENTER EVALUATION OF PROTOTYPE TEST OBJECTS AND PROTOCOLS FOR PERFORMANCE ASSESSMENT IN SMALL-BORE MRS EQUIPMENT

This paper reports the results of multicentre studies aimed at designi ng, constructing, and evaluating prototype test objects for performanc e assessment in small-bore MRS systems, by utilizing the test protocol s already proposed by the EEC COMAC-BME Concerted Action for clinical MRS equipment. Three classes of test objects were considered: (1) a mu lticompartment test object for P-31 MRS measurements performed with sl ice-selective sequences; (2) a two-compartment test object for volume- selection H-1 MRS; and (3) two-compartment test objects for assessing the performance of experimental systems using ISIS as volume localizat ion sequence in P-31 MRS. The results suggested the interest of adopti ng some of these prototypes for improving the comparison of spectrosco py data obtained from different sites, for providing useful means of q uality assurance in experimental MRS, and facilitating the validation of new localization sequences.