Impact of temporal resolution on cardiac phase-resolved oxygen-sensitive myocardial steady-state free precession imaging

Cardiac phase-resolved imaging studies that are used in the assessment of cardiac function are performed with a temporal resolution (TRES) of approximately 50 ms to mitigate the effects from cardiac motion and flow. To date, there has been minimal interest on the characterization of myocardial signal intensities from cine images. Steady-state free precession based cardiac phase-resolved blood-oxygen-level-dependent (CP-SSFP BOLD) imaging is a relatively new method for identifying myocardial oxygen abnormalities on the basis of regional signal differences. For reliable assessment of oxygenation changes, it is imperative to ensure that acquisitions enable robust image quality. We hypothesize that TRES plays a significant role on CP-SSFP image quality and that, in particular, myocardial signal characteristics disintegrate with elevations in TRES