N/2 ghosting artifacts: Elimination at 3.0-T MR cholangiography with SPACE pulse sequence

This HIPAA-compliant study had institutional review board approval, with waiver of informed consent. The purpose was to test the hypothesis that, compared with a standard magnetic resonance (MR) cholangiography sequence, MR cholangiography with a sampling, perfection with application optimized contrasts using different flip angle evolutions (SPACE) sequence reduces ghosting artifacts while maintaining image quality and sufficient contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) at 3.0 T. The study population consisted of 15 women and 14 men (mean age, 47:2 years +/- 18.1 [standard deviation]) who were consecutively referred for NIB cholangiography between November 2004 and November 2005. Acquisition times were lower and N/2 ghosting artifacts were eliminated with l SPACE. However, the SPACE sequence yielded images that were visually grainier and had lower CNR. Overall, E the readers preferred the appearance of images obtained with the SPACE sequence, most likely because of the elimination of N/2 ghosting artifacts. (C) RSNA, 2008.