Vascular space occupancy MRI during breathholding at 3 Tesla.
OBJECTIVE
To evaluate the vasodilatory response of normal human brain and meningiomas under repeated breathholding challenges using vascular space occupancy (VASO) MRI at 3 Tesla (T).


METHODS
Five normal volunteers and five patients with meningiomas were recruited for this study. For the normal group, VASO MRI during repeated breathholds of different duration (5 to 30 s) was acquired. Patients performed a 15-s breathhold paradigm for VASO MRI. The maximum signal change and full-width at half-maximum (FWHM) were determined by curve fitting.


RESULTS
Significant VASO signal decreases in the gray matter could be detected for a breathhold period as short as 5 s. The fractional activation volume vs. breathhold duration reached a plateau around 34.21 ± 3.39% at 15 s. In the patient group, there were significant VASO signal decreases in normal gray matters and also in small areas of three large-sized meningiomas.


CONCLUSIONS
The 3T VASO MRI detected significant signal decreases in the gray matter, but not in the white matter, during short periods of breathholding. The fractional activation volume reached the plateau at 15-s breathhold, which is recommended for clinical application.
Department of Medical Imaging, Buddhist Tzu Chi General Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
Yuan-Yu
YY
Hsu
Wen-Cheng
WC
Chu
Kun-Eng
KE
Lim
Ho-Ling
HL
Liu
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001932:Brain Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology*; D062485:Breath Holding; D002536:Cerebral Arteries / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007089:Image Enhancement / Q000379:methods*; D008279:Magnetic Resonance Imaging; D008297:Male; D008577:Meningeal Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology*; D008579:Meningioma / Q000473:pathology*; D008875:Middle Aged; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012680:Sensitivity and Specificity; D055815:Young Adult