7 MRI Artifacts You Should Never Let Slip Past

You know that sinking feeling when you glance at a completed series and something just looks… off? Maybe it is a faint ghosting you almost missed. Maybe it is a zipper that should not be there. Maybe it is motion you could have coached the patient through if you had caught it two minutes earlier.

MRI artifacts are not all created equal. Some are cosmetic noise that radiologists work around every day. Others? They change the read entirely—or worse, they send a patient back through your scanner for a do-over that costs time, money, and trust.

Here are seven artifacts every MRI tech should flag before the images leave your workstation. Think of this as your mental checklist for imaging quality assurance—the stuff that separates a good tech from a great one.

Motion Artifact: The One That Haunts Your Weekends

Let us start with the obvious offender. Motion artifact shows up as blurring, ghosting, or phase-encoding streaks across your image. It happens when patients move—intentionally or not—during acquisition.

What makes motion tricky is that it exists on a spectrum. A little respiratory motion in a liver sequence? Radiologists can usually read through it. But motion that obscures a suspected lesion or mimics pathology? That is a problem.

Quick visual cues:

• Repeated ghost images of anatomical structures in the phase-encoding direction
• Blurred edges on what should be sharp borders (like the spinal cord or vessel walls)
• Streaking that follows a rhythmic pattern (breathing, pulsation)

If you are seeing motion, ask yourself: can I re-coach the patient, use a shorter sequence, or add a strap? Do not let “good enough” become your standard when five extra minutes could save the study.

Aliasing (Wrap-Around): When Your FOV Plays Tricks

Aliasing happens when anatomy outside your field of view gets “wrapped” back into the image on the opposite side. It is a phase-encoding issue, and it is more common than it should be—especially when techs are rushing or working with larger patients.

The danger? Aliasing can mimic pathology or obscure real findings. A wrapped arm can look like a mass. A folded-over leg can hide a fracture.

How to spot it: Look for anatomy that should not be there—an elbow appearing near the opposite shoulder, or a chunk of abdomen showing up in a brain scan. If the edges do not make anatomical sense, you have got aliasing.

Fix it by increasing your FOV, using anti-aliasing options (like oversampling or no phase wrap), or repositioning the patient. This one is almost always preventable with a little setup attention.

Pro Tip for New Techs

If you are not sure whether it is aliasing or a real structure, toggle your localizer images. Aliasing will not show up in scout views the same way.

Chemical Shift: The Subtle Saboteur

Chemical shift artifact appears as a bright or dark line at fat-water interfaces—think kidney borders, vertebral endplates, or orbital margins. It happens because fat and water protons resonate at slightly different frequencies.

Most of the time, chemical shift is expected and radiologists know how to interpret it. But in certain sequences—especially when you are hunting for small lesions or evaluating surgical hardware—it can obscure critical details.

When to flag it:

• If the shift is so pronounced it is hiding a suspected abnormality
• In post-contrast studies where you need crisp margins
• When imaging near metal (it compounds with susceptibility artifacts)

You can minimize chemical shift by increasing your bandwidth or switching to fat-suppressed sequences. Just remember: this is not always an error—it is physics. Your job is to know when it matters.

Susceptibility Artifact: Metal, Air, and Chaos

Susceptibility artifact shows up as signal voids, geometric distortion, or bright halos near anything that disrupts the magnetic field—surgical hardware, dental work, air-tissue interfaces, even some tattoo inks.

This one is particularly important for MRI tech tips because patients do not always disclose metal. They forget about old shrapnel, permanent eyeliner, or that IUD from ten years ago.

Red flags to watch for: Large black voids that seem disproportionate to the clinical history, or distortion that makes anatomical structures unreadable. If you see susceptibility where you do not expect it, double-check your patient screening. Better to pause and ask than to miss something that could harm the patient or ruin your images.

For known hardware, consider using MARS (metal artifact reduction sequences) or adjusting your echo time and bandwidth. Sometimes a sequence swap is all you need.

Zipper Artifact: The RF Leak You Cannot Ignore

Zipper artifact looks like a bright line—usually vertical—cutting straight through your image. It is caused by radiofrequency interference leaking into the scan room, often from a door left ajar, a faulty RF shield, or external electronics.

This one is non-negotiable. If you see a zipper, stop and investigate. It means your RF shielding is compromised, and that is both a quality issue and a safety concern.

Common culprits: Doors not fully latched, damaged waveguide seals, or someone bringing a phone or pager into the room. Zipper artifacts are your early-warning system that something in your environment needs attention.

What to Do

Run a quick phantom scan to confirm. If the zipper persists, notify your service engineer. Do not just “work around it”—RF leaks can get worse and affect multiple studies.

Truncation (Gibbs) Artifact: The Ringing at the Edges

Truncation artifact appears as parallel lines or “ringing” near high-contrast edges—like the border between CSF and spinal cord, or a fluid-filled cyst next to solid tissue. It is a mathematical byproduct of how the MRI reconstructs images from frequency data.

Most of the time, radiologists recognize it for what it is. But in spine imaging—especially when you are looking for subtle cord lesions or syrinx—truncation can mimic pathology.

How to minimize it: Increase your matrix size (more phase-encoding steps) or apply a smoothing filter. The trade-off is scan time or slight resolution loss, so you will need to balance your protocol against clinical need.

If you are seeing truncation in a critical area and the radiologist flags it, document it and discuss protocol tweaks with your lead tech or physicist.

Magic Angle Artifact: The One That Tricks Everyone

Magic angle artifact is sneaky. It causes tendons, ligaments, and other collagenous structures to light up with abnormally high signal on short TE sequences—but only when they are oriented about 55 degrees relative to the main magnetic field.

Why does this matter? Because it can mimic tendinopathy, partial tears, or early degeneration. Radiologists who know to look for it will correlate with clinical history and other sequences. But if you do not flag it in your QA check, you risk sending images that look pathologic when they are not.

Classic locations: Achilles tendon, supraspinatus insertion, patellar tendon. If you see bright signal in these areas on a PD or T1 sequence, check patient positioning and compare to your T2 images. True pathology will stay bright; magic angle will normalize.

Your Imaging Quality Assurance Mindset

Here is the thing about artifacts: every single one on this list is either preventable, correctable, or at least recognizable if you are paying attention. The difference between a tech who catches them and one who does not often comes down to one habit—pausing for a final QA scroll before you release the study.

Make it part of your routine. Scroll through every series. Ask yourself: Would I want my own scan to look like this? If the answer is no, you know what to do.

And if you are looking for a team that values this kind of attention to detail—whether you are a radiology technologist hunting for your next contract or a facility trying to fill a critical MRI role—the Intuites Recruiting Team is here to help. We work with imaging professionals across the country who care about quality as much as you do. Drop us a line at contact@intuites.healthcare or visit intuites.healthcare. We would love to hear from you.

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