Philip M. Robson1, Claudia Calcagno1, Sarayu Ramachandran1, Venkatesh Mani1, Melanie Kotys-Traughber2, Zahi A. Fayad1
1Translational and Molecular Imaging Institute, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York, NY, United States; 2Philips Healthcare, Cleveland, OH, United States
Investigation of simultaneous imaging of the arterial input function and the vessel wall response in quantitative DCE of the carotid arteries in atherosclerosis requires acquisition of signal in the presence of highly concentrated contrast agent in the first-pass of the bolus. We employ a saturation-prepared segmented GRE acquisition and a signal model that accounts for inflow and non-steady-state conditions during acquisition. This strategy is assessed quantitatively in three subjects using the Stewart-Hamilton dilution principle, showing no significant difference (p=0.52) between the integral of the first pass of the concentration-time curve and the ratio of known dose and measured cardiac output.