INITIAL CLINICAL-EXPERIENCE IN MR-IMAGING OF THE BRAIN WITH A FAST FLUID-ATTENUATED INVERSION-RECOVERY PULSE SEQUENCE

PURPOSE To evaluate fast fluid-attenuated inversion-recovery (FLAIR) t echnique for imaging brain abnormalities. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A fas t FLAIR sequence was developed that provided 36 5-mm contiguous sectio ns in 5 minutes 8 seconds. Resulting images were compared with dual-ec ho T2-weighted spin-echo images of 41 consecutive patients with brain abnormalities. RESULTS: Contrast and contrast-to-noise ratios (C/Ns) ( for contrast between the lesion and background and between the lesion and cerebrospinal fluid) for fast FLAIR exceeded the corresponding val ues for T2-weighted spin-echo images for all but the second-echo lesio n-to-background C/N. Fast FLAIR provided equivalent or greater overall lesion conspicuity and enabled greater lesion detection in 98% and 10 0%, respectively, of the evaluations. Fast FLAIR images more often had image artifact, but this did not interfere with image interpretation in a significantly (P less than or equal to .05) greater number of eva luations.CONCLUSION: Fast FLAIR provides images that are superior to p roton-density- and T2-weighted images for many image quality criteria.