RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Arterial Spin-Labeling in Routine Clinical Practice, Part 1: Technique and Artifacts
JF American Journal of Neuroradiology
JO Am. J. Neuroradiol.
FD American Society of Neuroradiology
SP 1228
OP 1234
DO 10.3174/ajnr.A1030
VO 29
IS 7
A1 A.R. Deibler
A1 J.M. Pollock
A1 R.A. Kraft
A1 H. Tan
A1 J.H. Burdette
A1 J.A. Maldjian
YR 2008
UL http://www.ajnr.org/content/29/7/1228.abstract
AB SUMMARY: The routine use of arterial spin-labeling (ASL) in a clinical population has led to the depiction of diverse brain pathologic features. Unique challenges in the acquisition, postprocessing, and analysis of cerebral blood flow (CBF) maps are encountered in such a population, and high-quality ASL CBF maps can be generated consistently with attention to quality control and with the use of a dedicated postprocessing pipeline. Familiarity with commonly encountered artifacts can help avoid pitfalls in the interpretation of CBF maps. The purpose of this review was to describe our experience with a heterogeneous collection of ASL perfusion cases with an emphasis on methodology and common artifacts encountered with the technique. In a period of 1 year, more than 3000 pulsed ASL cases were performed as a component of routine clinical brain MR evaluation at both 1.5 and 3T. These ASL studies were analyzed with respect to overall image quality and patterns of perfusion on final gray-scale DICOM images and color Joint Photographic Experts Group (JPEG) CBF maps, and common artifacts and their impact on final image quality were categorized.