Impact of Reduced K-Space Acquisition on the Visibility of Moving Puncure Needles - a Phantom Study

Jens Christian Rump¹, Martin Jonczyk¹, Christian Jrgen Seebauer¹, Felix Gttler¹, Ulf Teichgrber¹, Bernd Hamm¹

The purpose of our study was to evaluate the feasibility of keyhole imaging of superposed needle movements in a phantom model using an imaging sequence with realistic interventional parameters for muscular-skeletal interventions. Therefore, MR-images with different keyhole update rates of the outer k-space from 15 to 100% of a moving needle were acquired. For a reproducable needle motion, the needle was driven by a custom made puncture simulator. The visibility was measured by the CNR, artifact width and the sharpness of the artifact edges. No significant changes of the visibility of the needle was found reducing the k-space. Even low update rates of the k-space allow a sufficient visualization of a puncture needle in muscularskeletal interventions.