Diffusion-presatured STIR for fat suppression during Gadolinium-enhanced MRI at the presence of metal implants

Motivation: When imaging near metal typical frequency-based fat suppression fails. T1-based (STIR) fat suppression works well, but unfortunately does not allow T1-weighted imaging such as contrast-enhanced imaging for cancer detection, necessitating post-pre subtractions, which lengthens scan times and is sensitive to motion. Goal(s): A method to enable robust fat suppression during Gadolinium-enhanced MRI at the presence of metal implants (9003). Approach: We combine diffusion preparation and short tau inversion recovery to suppress fat and provide T1 contrast in the presence of B0-variations. Results: Phantom scans show fat suppression and contrast enhancement, independent of frequency. Impact: A new diffusion-presaturated inversion recovery sequence enables contrast-enhanced imaging with fat suppression near metal within a single scan. This technique could replace subtraction of pre- and post-contrast images for fat suppression in applications such as cancer detection near metal.