MR perfusion weighted imaging

Perfusion weighted imaging is a term used to denote a variety of MRI techniques able to give insights into the perfusion of tissues by blood.

There are three techniques in wide use to derive one or more perfusion values:

• ​techniques
  • ​dynamic susceptibility contrast (DSC) MR perfusion
  • dynamic contrast enhanced (DCE) MR perfusion
  • arterial spin labeling (ASL) MR perfusion
• derived values
  • time to peak (TTP)
  • mean transit time (MTT)
  • cerebral blood volume (CBV)
  • cerebral blood flow (CBF)
  • negative enhancement integral (NEI)
  • k-trans

The main role of perfusion imaging is in evaluation of ischemic conditions (e.g. acute cerebral infarction to determine ischemic penumbra, moya-moya disease to identify vascular reserve), neoplasms (e.g. identify highest grade component of diffuse astrocytomas, help distinguish glioblastomas from cerebral metastases) and neurodegenerative diseases.