State of the art hybrid MRI: Advances in methodology and initial clinical results: Focusing on MR-PET

摘要

The year 2010 was the long-expected birth date of a new hybrid imaging modality starting its way into clinical diagnostics. In this year, the first whole-body positron emission tomography (PET)/magnetic resonance (MR) hybrid systems based on 3-T MR imagers reached product status and became commercially available. Since then, the number of worldwide installations of either trimodality PET/computed tomography (CT)-MR or sequential and simultaneous PET/MR systems has steadily increased and, as of today (December 2012), has reached a number of approximately 40 to 50 installations worldwide. This trend is ongoing, and we dare to predict that it will gain further pace once initial clinical evidence has been established, new diagnostic applications have been successfully introduced, and further technical refinements and products find their way into the clinical arena.