Sandeep N. Gupta1, Ehud J. Schmidt2, Robert Mulkern3, Andriy Fedorov2, Ileana Hancu1, Yingxuan Zhu1, Clare Tempany-Afdhal2, Fiona Fennessy2
1GE Global Research Center, Niskayuna, NY, United States; 2Radiology, Brigham and Women's Hospital, Boston, MA, United States; 3Radiology, Boston Children's Hospital, Boston, MA, United States
Dynamic Contrast Enhanced MRI has shown promise in non-invasive assessment of tumor vascular properties with applications in prostate cancer staging and treatment monitoring. Analysis of DCE requires knowledge of pre-contrast T1 maps. T1 mapping using Variable Flip Angle imaging is inaccurate due to B1 inhomogeneity. We present a simple approach for correcting VFA T1 maps by incorporating knowledge of approximate T1 of known reference tissue. This method can be used to produce clinically usable T1 maps in prostate. Our method was tested in 8 prostate patients and verified using a multiple-TR approach and the Bloch-Siegert B1 mapping method.