Leif Jensen1, Mark L. Schiebler1, Scott K. Nagle1, 2, Scott B. Reeder1, 3, Jeffrey P. Kanne1, Cristopher Meyer1, Tracey Weigel4, Christopher P. Franois1
1Radiology, UW-Madison, Madison, WI, United States; 2Medical Physics, UW-Madison, Madison, WI, United States; 3Biomedical Engineering, UW-Madison, Madison, WI, United States; 4Thoracic Surgery, UW-Madison, Madison, WI, United States
Non small cell lung cancer can be cured with surgical resection of disease limited to a hemi thorax. MRI has the advantage over CT and PET imaging in the diagnosis of vascular and cardiac invasion and for determining the feasibility of complex vertebral body and great vessel involvement by malignant masses. Precise delineation of tumor extent is critical in treatment planning. The use of cardiac gating bSSFP, tagged images, MRA, Diffusion Weighting, and Fat separation after contrast administration are all conventionally available pulse sequence methods that can be employed to help determine surgical resectabilty.