Joel P. Felmlee

Noninvasive Treatment of Uterine Fibroids: Early Mayo Clinic Experience With Magnetic Resonance Imaging-Guided Focused Ultrasound

Uterine fibroids often cause symptoms of pelvic pain, pressure, and bleeding. Traditional therapies have included medical (eg, hormonal therapy) and surgical (eg, myomectomy, hysterectomy) options. Recently, uterine artery embolization was added to the treatment armamentarium. We describe an exciting new non-invasive treatment option using focused ultrasound with magnetic resonance imaging and summarize the early experience at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn, during the initial research studies of this new technology.

Shear stiffness estimation using intravoxel phase dispersion in magnetic resonance elastography

Dynamic MR elastography (MRE) is a phase‐contrast technique in which the periodic shear motion of an object is encoded as variations in the phase of the reconstructed images. An alternative MRE method is presented whereby waves are depicted as intensity variations in the magnitude images due to intravoxel phase dispersion (IVPD). A theoretical framework is developed to model how the IVPD magnitude data are related to the underlying shear wave motion, and how they can be used to estimate shear stiffness. The results are shown in a series of phantom experiments to demonstrate that IVPD MRE complements phase‐contrast MRE. Magn Reson Med 50:1256–1265, 2003.