Maximizing Accuracy and Precision on Pharmacokinetic Parameter Estimates in DCE-MRI: What Is the Optimal Flip Angle?

Olivier Maciej Girard¹, Paul O. Scheibe², David R. Vera¹, Robert F. Mattrey¹

Dynamic Contrast Enhanced (DCE) MRI is a promising tool to investigate microvascular tissue properties. Although it has been applied in various clinical studies its accuracy still remains subject to debate since numerous errors may bias the pharmacokinetic (PK) parameter estimates. Here we propose to study the propagation of measurement noise and flip angle (FA) uncertainty up to the PK parameter estimates using a MonteCarlo simulation. Our results show that in the high FA regime, a high FA uncertainty leads to a much lower bias in the PK parameter estimates while keeping the standard error due to noise close to its minimum.