Patent Document ID: 20060235669
Application ID: 11324126
Patent Flag: 0

Claim One:
1. A method, comprising: displaying selected views of a 3D image of a portion of a patient's vasculature derived from 3D MRI volume data; selecting a particular image plane of the 3D MRI volume data from the 3D image; calculating a 2D image corresponding to the selected image plane from the 3D MRI volume data; defining a region of interest around a selected blood vessel in the 2D image, refining the region of interest to obtain the border of the selected blood vessel, and calculating a center point of the blood vessel; deriving a set of center points of the selected blood vessel from the 3D MRI volume data as the selected image plane is moved generally along the length of the selected blood vessel; and, defining a location and slice orientation for phase contrast magnetic resonance angiography corresponding to a selected pair of the identified center points.