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Turco A, Gheysens O, Duchenne J, Nuyts J, Rega F, Voigt JU, Vunckx K, Claus P. Partial volume and motion correction in cardiac PET: First results from an in vs ex vivo comparison using animal datasets. J Nucl Cardiol 2019; 26:2034-2044. [PMID: 30644052 DOI: 10.1007/s12350-018-01581-z] [Citation(s) in RCA: 3] [Impact Index Per Article: 0.6] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 06/01/2017] [Accepted: 11/07/2018] [Indexed: 11/26/2022]
Abstract
BACKGROUND In a previous study on ex vivo, static cardiac datasets, we investigated the benefits of performing partial volume correction (PVC) in cardiac 18F-Fluorodeoxyglucose(FDG) PET datasets. In the present study, we extend the analysis to in vivo cardiac datasets, with the aim of defining which reconstruction technique maximizes quantitative accuracy and, ultimately, makes PET a better diagnostic tool for cardiac pathologies. METHODS In vivo sheep datasets were acquired and reconstructed with/without motion correction and using several reconstruction algorithms (with/without resolution modeling, with/without non-anatomical priors). Corresponding ex vivo scans of the excised sheep hearts were performed on a small-animal PET scanner (Siemens Focus 220, microPET) to provide high-resolution reference data unaffected by respiratory and cardiac motion. A comparison between the in vivo cardiac reconstructions and the corresponding ex vivo ground truth was performed. RESULTS The use of an edge-preserving prior (Total Variation (TV) prior in this work) in combination with motion correction reduces the bias in absolute quantification when compared to the standard clinical reconstructions (- 0.83 vs - 3.74 SUV units), when the end-systolic gate is considered. At end-diastole, motion correction improves absolute quantification but the PVC with priors does not improve the similarity to the ground truth more than a regular iterative reconstruction with motion correction and without priors. Relative quantification was not influenced much by the chosen reconstruction algorithm. CONCLUSIONS The relative ranking of the algorithms suggests superiority of the PVC reconstructions with dual gating in terms of overall absolute quantification and noise properties. A well-tuned edge-preserving prior, such as TV, enhances the noise properties of the resulting images of the heart. The end-systolic gate yields the most accurate quantification of cardiac datasets.
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Affiliation(s)
- A Turco
- Department of Imaging and Pathology, Nuclear Medicine and Molecular imaging, Medical Imaging Research Center (MIRC), KU Leuven - University of Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, Medical Imaging Research Center (MIRC), KU Leuven - University of Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
| | - O Gheysens
- Department of Imaging and Pathology, Nuclear Medicine and Molecular imaging, Medical Imaging Research Center (MIRC), KU Leuven - University of Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
- Department of Nuclear Medicine, University Hospitals Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
| | - J Duchenne
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, Medical Imaging Research Center (MIRC), KU Leuven - University of Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
| | - J Nuyts
- Department of Imaging and Pathology, Nuclear Medicine and Molecular imaging, Medical Imaging Research Center (MIRC), KU Leuven - University of Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
| | - F Rega
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, Medical Imaging Research Center (MIRC), KU Leuven - University of Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
- Department of Cardiac Surgery, University Hospitals Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
| | - J U Voigt
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, Medical Imaging Research Center (MIRC), KU Leuven - University of Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
- Department of Cardiovascular Diseases, University Hospitals Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
| | - K Vunckx
- Department of Imaging and Pathology, Nuclear Medicine and Molecular imaging, Medical Imaging Research Center (MIRC), KU Leuven - University of Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium
| | - P Claus
- Department of Cardiovascular Sciences, Medical Imaging Research Center (MIRC), KU Leuven - University of Leuven, 3000, Leuven, Belgium.
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