Whole-body 3D water/fat resolved continuously moving table imaging

PURPOSE: To study the feasibility of three-dimensional (3D) whole-body, head-to-toe, water/fat resolved MRI, using continuously moving table imaging technology. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Experiments were performed on nine healthy volunteers, acquiring 3D whole-body head-to-toe data under continuous motion of the patient table. Two different approaches for water/fat separation have been studied. Results of a three-point chemical shift encoding and a spectral presaturation technique were compared with respect to image quality and performance. Furthermore, fast, low-resolution, whole-body water/fat imaging was performed in two minutes total scan time to derive patient-specific parameters such as the total water/fat ratio, the intraperitoneal/extraperitoneal fat ratio, and the body mass index (BMI). RESULTS: Good water/fat separation with decent image quality was obtained in all cases. The three-point chemical shift encoding approach was found to be more efficient with respect to signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and acquisition time. CONCLUSION: Whole-body water/fat sensitive MRI using continuous table motion is feasible and could be of interest for clinical practice. Some improvements of the method are desirable.