Tips and tricks for MR angiography of pediatric and adult congenital cardiovascular diseases.

Abstract

The use of contrast-enhanced MR angiography (MRA) as an alternative to CT angiography or conventional angiography to assess pediatric and adult patients with cardiovascular diseases has the potential to significantly reduce patients' lifetime exposure to ionizing radiation. However, imaging this group of patients can be challenging because of a number of factors, including small size, difficulty timing the contrast bolus to the territory of interest, and the presence of metallic susceptibility artifact resulting from stents or clips. We present some suggestions to overcome many of these obstacles to MRA in these patients, highlighted with illustrations from clinical cases.