MR-GUIDED BIOPSIES WITH AN ULTRAFAST HIGH -RESOLUTION T-2-WEIGHTED TURBO SPIN-ECHO SEQUENCE LOLO - FIRST CLINICAL-RESULTS

Purpose: The feasability of the ''LoLo''-technique for MR guidance of biopsy procedures was tested. Material and Methods: MR-guided biopsies were performed on 10 patients employing a 1.5 T system, The ''Lolo''- technique used is a single shot turbo spin echo technique. Only a smal l field of view is covered in order to yield images with a resolution of 1 mm(2) in 600 ms. The orthogonal orientation of the slice selectiv e radio frequency pulses to each other prevents foldover artifacts. Re sults: No complications occurred. All biopsy procedures yielded suffic ient material to diagnose the underlying disease. The ''LoLo''-techniq ue enabled good depiction of the needle tip in all cases. T-2-weighted contrast typical for turbo spin echo images was observed. No foldover artifacts were detectable. Conclusion: MR-guided biopsies are possibl e with the ''LoLo''-technique. Compared to gradient echo sequences T-2 -weighting and smaller susceptibility artifacts proved to be advantage ous.