Ultrahigh-field MPRAGE magnetic resonance angiography at 7.0 T in patients with cerebrovascular disease

Objectives: Time-of-flight (TOF) magnetic-resonance-angiography (MRA) identifies vessel pathology in cerebrovascular disease. At 7.0 T, the clinical performance of TOF-MRA is constrained owing to radio frequency power deposition. We studied the diagnostic value of whole-brain MPRAGE-based MRA as an alternative imaging technique in comparison to the clinical standard 3.0 T TOF-MRA. Methods: Patients with stroke and/or moya-moya disease were included. TOF-MRA was performed at 3.0 T and MPRAGE-MRA at 7.0 T. Two radiologists rated the MRAs independently for overall quality and local arterial segment visualization. The identification of steno-occlusive pathology was reported for each protocol. Results: In 18 patients (9 females; 6 patients with moya-moya) 7.0 T MPRAGE-MRA provided better overall image quality and better distinction of small structures compared to 3.0 T TOF-MRA. These findings were pronounced in the proximal segments of the anterior cerebral artery (A1), middle cerebral artery (M1, M2), posterior cerebral artery (P1) and the posterior communicating artery. Seven steno-occlusive findings were identified by both imaging protocols. Conclusions: For clinical studies using ultrahigh field MRI, 7.0 T MPRAGE-MRA provides a suitable alternative to TOF-MRA imaging to identify brain vessel pathology and yields simultaneous structural brain imaging within clinically feasible acquisition times.