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Transcranial duplex sonography of middle cerebral artery stenosis: a comparison of colour-coding techniques – frequency- or power-based Doppler and contrast enhancement

  • DIAGNOSTIC NEURORADIOLOGY
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Abstract

The main limitation of transcranial colour-coded duplex sonography (TCCD) is the inadequate acoustic window, which prevents transtemporal identification of the basal cerebral arteries in up to 30 % of cases, especially in the elderly. TCCD with different colour-coding techniques, including frequency-based colour-flow (CFD) or power (PD) Doppler sonography, used alone or in combination with contrast media, were used in 23 patients with middle cerebral artery (MCA) stenosis. In 10 patients a contrast medium (400 mg/ml SHU 508 A) was administered because of inadequate colour-coded visualisation with TCCD. The data were compared with angiographic methods. Digital subtraction angiography (DSA) revealed 2 low-grade, 11 middle-grade and 10 high-grade stenoses in the M1 segment. With TCCD, we found a 7.7 % higher blood flow velocity (systolic peak velocity) than with transcranial duplex sonography without colour-coding because of visual angle correction and a 20 % higher systolic peak velocity using contrast enhancement. CFD did not differ from PD in identification of low- and middle-grade MCA stenoses, but PD alone revealed two more cases of high-grade stenosis than CFD. The contrast medium increased diagnostic confidence in 8 of 10 cases. Only 2 of 23 MCA stenoses (9 %) could not be shown using TCCD.

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Received: 27 May 1997 Accepted: 5 January 1998

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Griewing, B., Schminke, U., Motsch, L. et al. Transcranial duplex sonography of middle cerebral artery stenosis: a comparison of colour-coding techniques – frequency- or power-based Doppler and contrast enhancement. Neuroradiology 40, 490–495 (1998). https://doi.org/10.1007/s002340050631

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s002340050631

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