New software for raw data mask processing increases diagnostic ability of myocardial SPECT imaging

Objective Increased activity of myocardial perfusion tracer technetium-99m in liver and hepatobiliary system causes streak artifacts, which may affect clinical diagnosis. We developed a mask-processing tool for raw data generated using technetium-99m as a myocardial perfusion tracer. Here, we descri...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Annals of nuclear medicine 2011-05, Vol.25 (4), p.231-239
Main Authors: Tanaka, Ryo, Yoshioka, Katsunori, Seino, Kazue, Ohba, Muneo, Nakamura, Tomoharu, Shimada, Katsuhiko
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Biological Transport
Humans
Image Processing, Computer-Assisted - methods
Imaging
Liver - metabolism
Medicine
Medicine & Public Health
Myocardial Perfusion Imaging - methods
Myocardium - metabolism
Nuclear Medicine
Organotechnetium Compounds - metabolism
Original Article
Phantoms, Imaging
Radiology
Software
Time Factors
Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon - methods
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Description
Summary:Objective Increased activity of myocardial perfusion tracer technetium-99m in liver and hepatobiliary system causes streak artifacts, which may affect clinical diagnosis. We developed a mask-processing tool for raw data generated using technetium-99m as a myocardial perfusion tracer. Here, we describe improvements in image quality under the influence of artifacts caused by high accumulation in other organs. Methods A heart phantom (RH-2) containing 15 MBq of pertechnetate was defined as model A. Model B was designed in the same phantom containing ten times of cardiac radioactivity overlapping with other organs. Variance in the vertical profile count in the lower part of the myocardial inferior wall and in the myocardial circumferential profile curve were investigated in a phantom and clinical cases using our raw data masking (RDM) software. Results The profile variances at lower parts of myocardial inferior walls were 965.43 in model A, 1390.11 in model B and 815.85 in B-RDM. The mean ± SD of myocardial circumferential profile curves were 83.91 ± 7.39 in model A, 69.61 ± 11.45 in model B and 82.68 ± 9.71 in model B-RDM. For 11 clinical images with streak artifacts, the average of the variance significantly differed between with and without RDM (3.95 vs. 21.05; P  
ISSN:0914-7187
1864-6433
DOI:10.1007/s12149-010-0447-x