Feasibility of High Resolution Diffusion Weighted MRI of the Breast Using Readout Segmented EPI or Single Shot EPI

Shotaro Kanao¹, Masako Kataoka¹, Mami Iima¹, Rena Sakaguchi¹, Natsuko Onishi¹, Tomohisa Okada¹, David Andrew Porter², Thorsten Feiweier², Kaori Togashi¹

Diffusion weighted MR imaging (DW-MRI) is expected to increase diagnostic accuracy of detecting breast cancer but compared to dynamic contrast MRI (DC-MRI), image quality is poor due to low spatial resolution and image distortion. We evaluated the feasibility of high resolution DW-MRI (special resolution of 1.0x1.0x2.5mm) of the breast, using newly-developed readout segmented echo planner imaging (RS-EPI) and single shot echo planner imaging (SS-EPI). High resolution DW-MRI of the breast was feasible in both RS-EPI and SS-EPI. DW-MRI using RS-EPI has advantage of less distortion.