Quantitative assessment of left ventricular function: steady-state free precession MR imaging with or without sensitivity encoding

Quantitative left ventricular (LV) function was assessed with magnetic resonance imaging in 20 patients by using standard multisection multiphase steady-state free precession (SSFP) imaging and sensitivity encoding (SENSE)-accelerated cine SSFP imaging with identical spatial, contrast, and temporal resolution. The local institutional review board approved the protocol, and all patients gave signed informed consent prior to imaging. The study complied with the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act. Results of Bland-Altman analysis showed that both techniques produced similar estimates of LV ejection fraction, LV mass, and blood-to-muscle contrast and demonstrated minimal interobserver variability. The authors showed that it is possible, by combining SENSE with cine SSFP imaging, to reduce acquisition time by 50% without compromising spatial resolution, temporal resolution, or blood-to-muscle contrast-to-noise ratio compared with those achieved by using SSFP imaging without SENSE for quantitative LV function assessment.