Rapid measurement of renal artery blood flow with ungated spiral phase‐contrast MRI

Abstract

To verify the potential of ungated spiral phase-contrast (USPC), which has been shown to provide accurate and reproducible time-averaged measurements of pulsatile flow, for rapid measurement of renal artery blood flow (RABF) in vivo. The RABF rates of 11 normal human subjects and one patient with renal failure were measured with USPC within six seconds. Rapid USPC scans produced reproducible RABF measurements (SD < or = 9%) that agreed with the normal RABF rates known from the literature. The RABF rates of the patient with renal failure were substantially less (<50-65%) than the normal RABF rates. The results demonstrate that it is now possible to obtain rapid and consistent RABF measurements within six seconds with USPC.