The FDA has cleared Siemens Healthcare’s new GOBrain and Simultaneous Multi-Slice (SMS) MRI applications, which are designed to reduce the time it takes to perform MRI brain exams. The latter application, Siemens officials say, reduces the time to acquire 2D MR images by as much as eight times since it takes images simultaneously as opposed to sequentially. Benefiting patients who possess limited tolerance for longer scan times, such as pediatric and geriatric patients, SMS may also facilitate surgical mapping in brain surgery cases.
Further, the GOBrain application—which enables examinations in 5 minutes—facilitates the acquisition of clinically essential image orientations and contrasts. Siemens personnel credit the company’s high-channel density coils and the MRI scanning software, DotGO, with this ability. Along with helping improve patient throughput, GOBrain potentially reduces the need for expensive rescans as well as sedation, they say.
Murat Gungor, Siemens’ vice president of MR, says both applications have big implications for the brain imaging field. “The SMS and GOBrain applications… enable our customers to dramatically cut MRI scan acquisition times and provide a significantly more patient-friendly brain MRI examination,” he says.
The SMS application is available on Siemens’ Magnetom Aera 1.5T, Magnetom Skyra 3T, and Magnetom Prisma and Prisma Fit 3T MRI systems while the Magnetom Aera and Magnetom Skyra systems feature GOBrain.
For more information about this technology, visit Siemens Healthcare.
