Aim: To evaluate the image quality of bone-vessel fused volume-rendering (VR) images reconstructed by magnetic resonance (MR) three-dimensional "black bone" imaging based on the fast imaging employing steady-state acquisition cycled phases (FIESTA-C) sequence and time of flight MR angiography (TOF-MRA). Materials and Methods: Seventeen patients were analyzed in this retrospective study. All patients underwent both MR scanning including FIESTA-C and TOF-MRA and computed tomography-angiography (CTA). MR-and CT-based bone-vessel VR images were respectively reconstructed. Visual depictions of frontal and parietal branches from the superficial temporal artery (STA) were independently scored by three experienced radiological technologists using a four-grade system. Results: In the visual evaluation, the scores of the both right and left frontal branches in MR based VR image were significantly larger those in CT (p<0.01, respectively). The scores of both the right and left parietal branches tended to be larger in in MR-based than that in CT-based VR imaging, but weren't significantly so (p=0.06, 0.13 respectively). In the inter-observer agreement analysis, κ values were all good (range: 0.6-0.76) for STA branch evaluation in MR-based VR images. Conclusion: MR bone-vessel fused VR imaging can non-invasively depict STA frontal branches with better visibility compared to the CT-based VR imaging. This technique may be useful for the preoperative evaluation of donor branches for STA-MCA bypass surgery. Non-invasive Three-dimensional Bone-Vessel Image Fusion using Black Bone MRI based on FIESTA-C
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