Susceptibility Weighted Imaging Complements Diffusion Tensor Imaging in Traumatic Brain Injury

Zhifeng Kou¹, Randall R. Benson², Ramtilak Gattu¹, E Mark Haacke¹

Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and susceptibility weighted imaging (SWI) have been reported to be sensitive to white matter injury and microhemorrhages, respectively, in traumatic brain injury (TBI). We developed an approach to complementary using both SWI and DTI to improve the detection of TBI. Our data showed that DTI is sensitive to white matter injury that looks normal in structural imaging, including SWI; and SWI is sensitive to microhemorrhages at gray matter and gray/white matter junctions that DTI and conventional MRI fail to detect. A complementary use of both DTI and SWI could improve the detection of traumatic brain injury.