Alastair Martin1,
Prasheel Lillaney1, Maythem Saeed1, Fabio Settlecase2,
Leland Evans3, Mark Wilson1, Steven W. Hetts3
1Radiology
and Biomedical Imaging, UCSF, San Francisco, CA, United States; 2Dept
of Medical Imaging, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Toronto, ON, Canada; 3Radiology
and Biomedical Imaging, University of California San Francisco, San
Francisco, CA, United States
An imaging technique is presented for guiding magnetically-assisted remote control (MARC) catheters with MR methods. The technique is based on establishing an initial roadmap angiogram via intra-arterial delivery of Gd-based contrast. This mask is subsequently subtracted from later dynamic acquisitions, revealing local arterial anatomy after washout of the contrast injection. By utilizing thick 2D slices and keyhole methods high temporal resolution can be achieved in combination with low contrast requirements and low SAR. This methodology is demonstrated in a swine model where the artifacts produced by MARC catheter activation are negated, improving visualization of arterial anatomy during navigation.
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