Abstract #2416

High-Resolution Imaging of the Laryngeal Cartilages: Volunteer and Cancer Patient Studies

Jolle Karine Barral¹, R. Reeve Ingle¹, Edward J. Damrose², Nancy J. Fischbein^2,3, Dwight G. Nishimura¹

¹Electrical Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, United States; ²Otolaryngology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, United States; ³Radiology, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, United States

Current staging of laryngeal cancer and choice of optimal treatment are hindered by the difficulty of accurately assessing cartilage invasion. The use of a dedicated three-channel array instead of the conventional eight-channel neuro-vascular array allows a reduction in voxel size by a factor of 20. A low-order polynomial fitting approach is used to compensate for the coil sensitivity profile. In healthy volunteers, the increased resolution makes visible the delineation of non-ossified cartilage, otherwise indistinguishable from muscle. The dedicated array is also used in cancer patients, and improvement in image quality is demonstrated.