High-Resolution Vessel Wall Magnetic Resonance Imaging of the Middle Cerebral Artery: Comparison of 3D CUBE T1-Weighted Sequence with and without Fat Suppression

BACKGROUND: Fat suppression is an important technique in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI). Comprehensive and quantitative assessment of the influence of fat suppression (FS) on T1-weighted imaging of intracranial vessel wall imaging is needed. In this study, we compared the three-dimensional (3D) variable-flip-angle turbo-spin-echo (CUBE) T1-weighted sequence with and without FS to investigate the differences between the 2 sequences in imaging of the middle cerebral artery (MCA) vessel walls. MATERIAL/METHODS: A 3D CUBE T1-weighted sequence with and without FS by 3.0T MRI was used to obtain intracranial vessel wall images of 105 MCA stenosis patients. The image signal intensity, signal-to-noise ratio, and contrast-to-noise ratio were calculated and compared. Two observers evaluated the image quality of the 2 sequences twice, and interobserver and intraobserver consistency were determined. Differences between the 2 sequences in the area of lumen and plaque were compared. RESULTS: The signal intensity, signal-to-noise ratio, and contrast-to-noise ratio of the 3D CUBE T1-weighted sequence without FS were higher, whereas the noise level was lower. In terms of subjective scores, the 3D CUBE T1-weighted sequence without FS performed better. No significant difference was observed in the measurement of the vascular lumen area between the 2 sequences, although there were statistically significant differences in the measurement of plaque area (i.e., the measurement obtained with 3D CUBE T1-weighted sequence without FS was larger). CONCLUSIONS: 3D CUBE T1-weighted sequence without FS performed better for MCA vessel walls imaging than 3D CUBE T1-weighted sequence with FS.