Reliable in-plane velocity measurements with magnetic resonance velocity imaging

Magnetic resonance (MR) imaging is a well-known diagnostic imaging modality. In addition to its high-quality imaging capabilities, hydrogen-based MR can also provide non-invasively the velocity of water-based fluids in all three spatial directions (through-plane and in-plane) in an image. Many previous studies showed that MR velocity imaging can accurately measure the through-plane velocity. The aim of this study was to evaluate how reliable are the in-plane velocity measurements in an image. The axial velocity of water in horizontal tubes (inner diameter: 14.7–26.2 mm) was measured with segmented (fast) and non-segmented (slow) k-space MR velocity imaging using: (a) an imaging slice placed perpendicular to the tube axis with through-plane velocity-encoding; and (b) an imaging slice placed parallel to the tube axis with in-plane velocity-encoding. The two planes intersected along the vertical tube-centerline. The flow rate was accurately quantified (mean error <10%) and the in-plane velocity profiles were not significantly different from the through-plane profiles (mean difference =6%, correlation coefficients >0.98). There was no significant difference between the velocity profiles from the segmented and the non-segmented sequences (mean difference <1%, correlation coefficients >0.95). The results of this study suggest that fast MR velocity imaging can measure the in-plane velocity in an image with reliability.