Jalal Badi Andre1, Greg Zaharchuk1,
Nancy J. Fischbein1, Michael Augustin2, Stefan Skare1,
Jarrett Rosenberg1, Maarten Lansberg3, Stephanie Kemp3,
Christine Wijman3, Gregory W. Albers3, Roland Bammer1
1Radiology, Stanford
University, Stanford, CA, United States; 2Radiology, University of
Graz, Graz, Austria; 3Neurology & Neurological Sciences,
Stanford University, Stanford, CA, United States
Earlier studies have indicated that parallel imaging might improve diagnostic quality of DWI, but the individual contributions of matrix and acceleration factor have not been investigated thus far. This prospective NIH funded study independently examines these effects in 192 patient scans, in which 3 blinded readers determined that accelerated scans (R=3) demonstrated improved image quality and less susceptibility artifact compared with unaccelerated standard DWI, without adverse effects on lesion conspicuity, subjective noise assessment, or motion artifact. The readers preferred R=3 accelerated 192x192 matrix scans to provide the most optimal imaging conditions for clinical DWI at 1.5T.