Purpose or Case Report: Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is a robust imaging modality. However, the necessity for patients to hold still commonly requires pediatric patients to be sedated (which carries its own risks), or limits the useful scan time window in some nonsedated pediatric patients. In some circumstances, there is no way to control the movement of the imaging target (i.e. fetal MRI).

MRI is also very customizable, and there are number of options currently available to accelerate MR imaging. It is important for pediatric radiologists supervising pediatric MRI examinations to have a broad understanding of the technology that is currently available, in order to optimize imaging quality and mitigate sedation use.

In this educational exhibit, we will briefly review a number of acceleration techniques available on the Siemens platform, noting that other vendors have very similar options available for their customers. These techniques will include single-shot fast spin echo , balanced steady-state gradient echo, parallel imaging, radial imaging, and simultaneous multislice imaging. Our review will focus on the relative advantages and disadvantages of these techniques, rather than on the physics of image generation.
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