Coronary arteries: Contrast-enhanced MR imaging with SH L 643A - Experience in 12 volunteers

PURPOSE: To assess SH L 643A for three-dimensional breath-hold and respiratory-gated agnetic resonance (MR) imaging in the depiction of coronary arteries. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Twelve healthy male volunteers underwent either three-dimensional breath-hold (n = 6) or respiratory-gated (n = 6) coronary MR angiography before and after intravenous injection of 0.1 mmol SH L 643A per kilogram of body weight. For nonenhanced and contrast material-enhanced examinations, signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) measurements were obtained. Image quality was assessed in consensus with a five-point scale. Statistical analysis of nonenhanced and contrast-enhanced images was based on a two-tailed paired Student t test. A P value at the .05 significance level was used. RESULTS: Overall statistically significant improvement in CNR was observed after administration of SH L 643A compared with that on nonenhanced images (8.7 ± 5.3 [SD] vs 23.6 ± 7.2, P < .01). While SNR of contrast-enhanced images showed improvement over that of nonenhanced images, the difference was not statistically significant (25.4 ± 0.8 vs 30.2 ± 16.8, P > .2). Image quality improved from a mean of 3.1 ± 0.8 for nonenhanced images to 4.0 ± 0.8 (P < .01) for contrast-enhanced images. CONCLUSION: SH L 643A causes significant improvement of the blood-myocardium contrast enhancement at coronary MR angiography compared with that with nonenhanced sequences.