High-spatial-resolution whole-body MR angiography with high-acceleration parallel acquisition and 32-channel 3.0-T unit: initial experience.

The purpose of this HIPAA-compliant study was to prospectively evaluate the technical feasibility of a multistation high-spatial-resolution whole-body magnetic resonance (MR) angiography protocol in which high-acceleration parallel imaging (with acceleration factors of three and four) is performed with a 32-channel 3.0-T MR system. After institutional review board approval and written informed consent were obtained, 10 healthy volunteers (four men and six women aged 23-68 years) and four patients (two men and two women aged 56-79 years) suspected of having peripheral vascular disease underwent multistation whole-body contrast material-enhanced MR angiography. Use of multiarray surface coil technology and highly accelerated generalized autocalibrating partially parallel acquisition enabled the acquisition of isotropic high-spatial-resolution three-dimensional data sets for multiple stations. Two radiologists independently evaluated arterial image quality and presence of arterial stenoses. All examinations yielded good or excellent image quality. Interobserver agreement was excellent (kappa = 0.92; 95% confidence interval: 0.86, 0.96). Multistation whole-body MR angiography with high-acceleration parallel acquisition is feasible at 3.0 T. Further clinical studies combined with ongoing optimization of radiofrequency systems and coils seem warranted to advance the potential of this technology.