The application of a three-dimensional gradient spin‒echo sequence (GRASE) in magnetic resonance cholangiopancreatography

To explore the application value of three-dimensional breath-hold gradient spin echo sequence (3D BH-GRASE) in MRCP. We conducted MRCP imaging on 56 patients with pancreatic and biliary diseases via both 3D BH-GRASE and 3D NT-TSE. We compared and statistically analysed the acquisition time, signal-to-noise ratio (SNR), contrast ratio (CR), contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR), and image quality between the two techniques. The mean image acquisition time of 3D BH-GRASE was 16.4 s, which was significantly shorter than the (238.12 ± 43.85) seconds required for 3D NT-TSE (p < 0.05). Compared with3D NT-TSE, 3D BH-GRASE achieved superior scores in overall image quality, artifacts, and visualization of the common bile duct, hepatic duct, and gallbladder/cystic duct (p < 0.05), but not in the left/right hepatic ducts. In contrast, 3D BH-GRASE was significantly inferior to 3D NT-TSE in visualizing the left and right secondary hepatic ducts (p < 0.05), although not for the pancreatic duct. The image quality scores of the 3D NT-TSE group combined with the 3D BH-GRASE group were significantly greater than those of the individual sequences (p < 0.05). 3D BH-GRASE addresses image quality concerns arising from motion artefacts in 3D NT-TSE and serves as a valuable supplementary imaging modality.