Erik Hedstrom1, 2, Ashish S. Patel, 23, Tobias Voigt1, 4, Bijan Modarai, 23, Tobias Schaeffter1, 2, Alberto Smith, 23, Eike Nagel1, 2
1Division of Imaging Sciences and Biomedical Engineering, King's College London, London, Greater London, United Kingdom; 2BHF Centre of Research Excellence and NIHR Biomedical Research Centre at Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Fo, London, United Kingdom; 3Academic Department of Surgery, King's College London, London, Greater London, United Kingdom; 4Philips Research, Clinical Research Europe
BOLD MRI of lower limb muscle has shown low reproducibility using relatively low-resolution EPI-readout GRE sequences, which may partly be related to partial volume effects. We propose a high-resolution GRE sequence without EPI readout to decrease partial volume effects and test it in elderly men without limb disease during transient ischaemia induced by cuffing to suprasystolic pressure. We show low intrascan variability and high interscan reproducibility for measurement of T2* in limb muscle, indicating that serial assessment of limb muscle oxygenation is possible.