Introduction: In this study we applied 7.0 T MR in patients with cerebrovascular diseases to demonstrate if high field strength MR can provide additional information
Methods: Between November 2010 and December 2012, 81 patients with cerebrovascular diseases were recruited in this study. Institutional review boards’ approval and written informed consent were obtained. All patients were examined with 7.0T MR. The SWI sequence was a fully velocity-compensated (with gradient moment nullin in all three orthogonal directions), three dimensional, gradient-echo sequence, with the following parameters: TR = 23 ms, TE = 15 ms, FA = 12°, Nz = 44 slices, slice thickness = 2.5 mm, matrix size (Ny × Nx) = 768 × 768, in-plane field-of-view (FOV) = 221 × 200 mm2, partial Fouriery,z = 7/8, resolution = 0.3×0.3×2.5 mm3, total acquisition time = 9 min. The turbo-spin echo (TSE) sequence: TE / TR = 70 / 9640 ms, FA = 60°, slice thickness = 2.0 mm, 33 slices with distant of 1 mm, matrix size = 768 (x) × 752 (y), field-of-view (FOV) = 200 × 190 mm2, resolution = 0.3×0.3×2.0 mm3, total acquisition time = 11 min.
Results: Altogether there are 41 moyamoya cases, 33 cavernous hemangioma cases, 5 AVM cases, 2 venous malformation cases (Figure 1) and 1 sturge webber case. Among the 41 moyamoya cases, 9 have sporadic micro-bleeding observed on SWI sequence (Figure 2). 20 hemispheres have cortical ischemic infactions in which 18 hemispheres display low signal in infarction areas which are considered hemorrhagic transformation (Figure 3). Multiple lesions are detected in 15/33 cavernous hemangioma cases (Figure 4) and one CM lesion was accompanied with venous malformation (Figure 5). In sturge webber case, atrophy of deep venous drainage and corresponding formation of venous malformation can be detected (Figure 6).
Conclusions: 7.0T MR can be successfully applied in clinical examination of cerebrovascular diseases. SWI combined with 7.0TeslaMR show higher sensitivity to detect microhemorrhages and display detail information than conventional imaging methods, especially CM, moyamoya and venous malformation.
Patient Care: A NEW METHOD TO DETECT DISEASE
Learning Objectives: INTRODUECE A NEW METHOD