Vendors Eye Image Quality as CT Dose Drops
For the past several years, the makers of CT scanners have focused on the development of software that reduces the x-ray dose while maintaining image quality similar to that achieved at higher doses. Now, those manufacturers are talking about switching gears. The latest developments in noise-reduction algorithms have achieved the goal of less than 1 mSv for many CT examinations and less than 3 mSv for others. For the first time in the better part of a decade, vendors are talking enthusiastically about writing algorithms that improve image quality.
The reasons for returning to the roots of modern imaging were showcased at the most recent meeting of the Radiological Society of North American (RSNA). GE displayed crystal-clear images of the head achieved at 0.5 mSv, the chest at 0.05 mSv, the abdomen/pelvis at 0.061 mSv, and pediatric sinus at 0.016 mSv. Other vendors documented similarly impressive claims using their own proprietary algorithms.
If it all seemed a bit like a celebration -- like the parade at the end of a hard-fought war -- that's probably because it was. The war on dose has been won, vendors say. Now it makes sense to pull back on research and development efforts to reduce dose and to redeploy those efforts to boost image quality. But, as commonly happens in military ventures, not all who are fighting a war define victory in the same way.
Toshiba's Aquilion™ ONE captures a prospective cardiac CT angiogram in a single gantry rotation, delivering an effective dose of 0.4 mSv. Noise was processed out of the image using Toshiba's work-in-progress adaptive iterative dose reduction3D algorithm.
Vendors have conquered dose technologically, but not practically. Their successes have been on the fringes of radiologic practice, at large teaching institutions with the latest equipment -- a kind of success akin to quelling unrest in urban centers while an insurgency rages in the countryside. Achieving peace in the dose arena may require a political rather than a technologic solution. The technology of dose reduction currently in hand must be more widely adopted. In the meantime, vendors want to move on to address image quality.
Medscape Radiology © 2012
WebMD, LLC
Cite this: Vendors Eye Image Quality as CT Dose Drops - Medscape - Mar 27, 2012.
Comments