Dissection of the thoracic aorta: pre- and postoperative findings on turbo-FLASH MR images obtained in the plane of the aortic arch.

This pictorial essay illustrates the pre- and postoperative findings seen in patients with aortic dissections on contrast-enhanced turbo-fast low-angle shot (FLASH) MR images obtained in the plane of the aortic arch. Contrast-enhanced images provide morphologic and functional information not normally available with conventional spin-echo (SE) MR imaging or dynamic CT. Preoperative examination of the acute dissection is often troubled by cardiovascular insufficiency and motion artifacts. Therefore most of our patients were examined postoperatively. The main reason for postsurgical imaging is the evaluation of the flow in the different lumina and the detection of complications (i.e., aneurysms or progress of dissection).