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Siemens designed Espree – Pink for breast MRI studies.

Siemens is ramping up its activities in breast MRI with the launch of Magnetom Espree – Pink, a new version of the Espree 1.5-tesla scanner that’s optimized for breast imaging. The scanner includes an 8-channel breast coil from Sentinelle Medical of Toronto that can be used for both imaging and biopsy applications.

Siemens is emphasizing Espree’s wide 70-cm aperture and 125-cm bore length as making the system more patient-friendly for breast MRI scans, while the system’s 550-lb table limit makes it possible to scan larger patients. Espree – Pink will begin shipping in early 2009.

Siemens is also talking up syngo Brevis, a multimodality workstation for breast MR and mammography, as well as new dedicated breast coils for 1.5-tesla and 3-tesla scanners using its Total image matrix (Tim) coil concept. An advanced imaging coil will be available with 16 radiofrequency channels.

Meanwhile, Siemens isn’t ignoring men’s health — the company is highlighting syngo Tissue 4D, an application for analyzing dynamic data from prostate and liver MRI studies. Tissue 4D has two types of workflow, standard and pharmacokinetic modeling (PKM). PKM quantifies contrast uptake and can be used for oncology workflow and follow-up studies.

Another new MRI application, syngo TimCT Oncology, is designed to enable continuous table movement for extended field-of-view imaging. Siemens believes the application reduces the need for rescheduling multiple exams — for example, a pelvic exam can be completed in as little as 20 minutes.

Finally, Siemens is introducing syngo Grace @ 3T, a quantitative MR breast spectroscopy application that monitors choline as a biomarker, providing information on the biochemical composition of breast lesions. Preliminary results indicate that detection of choline signal in breast tumors correlates with breast cancer, and Siemens believes that checking relative choline concentration during therapy makes treatment monitoring more reliable.