Magnetic resonance of the chest: initial experience with imaging and in vivo T1 and T2 calculations.

Magnetic resonance (MR) imaging of the chest was performed in 33 patients; 28 patients had a variety of malignant tumors and five had benign processes involving the pleura, chest wall, mediastinum, hila , and pulmonary parenchyma. In addition, in vivo T1 and T2 calculations were performed on 17 malignancies and 2 benign processes. Of the 18 patients examined with both MR and computed tomography (CT), 15 MR examinations were considered to be as diagnostic as CT in demonstrating abnormalities. In two cases, CT was superior to MR. In one case without adequate vascular opacification on CT, MR was superior in differentiating a mass from pulmonary artery. It is concluded that, with current technology without respiratory or cardiac gating, MR offers little improvement in diagnosis over contrast-enhanced CT. Furthermore, it does not appear possible to predict tissue type based on T1 and T2 measurements because of a wide overlap in these values.