C A. Azlan1,2, Pierluigi Di Giovanni1, Trevor S. Ahearn1, Gordon D. Waiter1, Scott I. Semple3, Fiona J. Gilbert1, Thomas W. Redpath1
1Aberdeen Biomedical Imaging Centre, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, Scotland, UK; 2Department of Biomedical Imaging, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia; 3Department of Medical Physics, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland, UK
In quantitative DCE-MRI pre-contrast T1s are normally measured using multiple flip angle FLASH with a short TR. This technique might produce errors contributed by the incomplete spoiling of transverse relaxation. We compare the T1s of gel phantoms measured using multi flip angle FLASH at short and long TR with an inversion recovery (IR) technique. We show that T1 measurement at long TR closely matches those with the IR approach. However, a short TR sequence can give errors in T1 over 100%. This error in T1 will have a direct consequence of the accuracy in pharmacokinetic parameters estimated.