Low-field Picker breast coil approved

Picker International received Food and Drug Administration 510(k) clearance in December to marketa bilateral breast coil for its 0.1-tesla Merit MRI scanner. Thetransmit/receive coil is designed to image one or both breastssimultaneously, with its field-of-view covering surrounding tissueincluding axillary nodes, the Cleveland manufacturer said.

Two software programs are included with the coil. One monitorscontrast-medium uptake, while the other is a phase imaging sequencethat uses a special fat-suppression technique to accommodate circumstancesencountered with MRI breast imaging at low field strength, accordingto Picker.

Merit is manufactured by Picker Nordstar, a joint venture ofPicker and Instrumentarium Imaging of Helsinki (SCAN 2/10/93).Picker received FDA clearance for a bilateral breast coil forits mid- and high-field MRI systems in 1992.