PHASED-ARRAY MAGNETIC-RESONANCE-IMAGING OF THE CAROTID-ARTERY BIFURCATION - PRELIMINARY-RESULTS IN HEALTHY-VOLUNTEERS AND A PATIENT WITH ATHEROSCLEROTIC DISEASE
C. Yuan et al., PHASED-ARRAY MAGNETIC-RESONANCE-IMAGING OF THE CAROTID-ARTERY BIFURCATION - PRELIMINARY-RESULTS IN HEALTHY-VOLUNTEERS AND A PATIENT WITH ATHEROSCLEROTIC DISEASE, Journal of magnetic resonance imaging, 5(5), 1995, pp. 561-565
A high resolution MR imaging technique using a custom designed flexibl
e phased-array surface coil was developed to examine the wall of the c
arotid artery bifurcation in vivo, The phased-array consisted of two o
verlapping coils which increased the image signal-to-noise ratio at th
e depth of the carotid artery by approximately 70%, relative to a simi
larly sized single loop coil, The imaging protocol included a 2D T1-we
ighted (T1W) spin echo scan and cardiac gated TP-weighted and proton d
ensity-weighted (PDW) fast spin-echo (FSE) scans. Images were obtained
of six healthy volunteers and of one patient with known atherosclerot
ic disease several days before carotid endarterectomy. On T1W and PDW
images of the healthy volunteers, the carotid arterial wall appeared t
o be comprised of two concentric rings; a high signal inner ring and a
lower signal outer ring, The MR images of the patient revealed a calc
ified carotid bifurcation plaque which was confirmed during surgery, T
he endarterectomy specimen was imaged in vitro with MR and then sectio
ned histologically for correlation with the patients in vivo images, O
ur preliminary findings indicate that a high resolution technique may
provide a noninvasive technique to study atherosclerosis of the caroti
d bifurcation.