Use of compressed sensing to reduce scan time and breath-holding for cardiac cine balanced steady-state free precession magnetic resonance imaging in children and young adults

Abstract

Conventional pediatric volumetric MRI acquisitions of a short-axis stack typically require multiple breath-holds under anesthesia. Here, we aimed to validate a vendor-optimized compressed-sensing approach to reduce scan time during short-axis balanced steady-state free precession (bSSFP) cine imaging. Imaging was performed in 28 patients (16±9 years) in this study on a commercial 3-tesla (T) scanner using retrospective electrocardiogram-gated cine bSSFP. Cine short-axis images covering both ventricles were acquired with conventional parallel imaging and a vendor-optimized parallel imaging/compressed-sensing approach. Qualitative Likert scoring for blood–myocardial contrast, edge definition, and presence of artifact was performed by two experienced radiologists. Quantitative comparisons were performed including biventricular size and function. A paired t-test was used to detect significant differences (P<0.05). Scan duration was 7±2 s/slice for conventional imaging (147±33 s total) vs. 4±2 s/slice for compressed sensing (83±28 s total). No significant differences were found with qualitative image scores for blood–myocardial contrast, edge definition, and presence of artifact. No significant differences were found in volumetric analysis between the two sequences. The number of breath-holds was 10±4 for conventional imaging and 5±3 for compressed sensing. Compressed sensing allowed for a 50% reduction in the number of breath-holds and a 43% reduction in the total scan time without differences in the qualitative or quantitative measurements as compared to the conventional technique.