GE Healthcare introduces new 1.5T Magnetic Resonance Imaging System at Arab Health 2009

The Discovery MR450 offers some of the most advanced capabilities available on any 1.5T system, including real-time cardiac imaging, single-acquisition, multi-contrast abdominal images with outstanding fat/water separation and ultra high-resolution musculoskeletal exams with high patient throughput.

Jim Davis, Vice President & General Manager for GE Healthcare's global MR business, said: "The Discovery MR450 combines unique workflow features with the advanced MR acquisition technology in the industry, allowing our customers to more easily conduct challenging exams, improve productivity, and become the leaders in their field. It will be of particular relevance to the Middle East region, where early detection of diseases will make treatments easier and cost-effective."

Built around the company's proven short-bore, superconducting 1.5T magnet — the Discovery™ MR450 delivers high homogeneity for excellent results even when imaging with a large or off-center field of view (FOV). Workflow and productivity issues are also addressed with the new system with gains of up to 60% additional anatomical coverage and resolution per unit time compared to conventional systems, increased acquisition speed over previous generations of 1.5T systems.

GE's Discovery MR450 features several new advanced applications, including: SWAN (T2 Star Weighted Angiography), which combines a unique 3D T2*-based multi-echo acquisition with a special reconstruction algorithm. It generates several echoes, which are read out at different TE times, and compiles magnetic signatures of a range of tissues with varying degrees of T2* contrast.

With SWAN, users can visualize major vessels and large vascular structures, accurately delineate small vessels and microbleeds, assess iron and calcium deposits in tissue and image the whole brain in 3D high resolution in just 4 minutes.

The new GE suite of Inhance Non-Contrast Enhanced MR Angiography (MRA) applications is robust, fast and easy to use. Inhance sequences deliver consistent, reproducible images even in difficult-to-scan anatomies, for fewer rescans and confident differential diagnoses.