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Visual assessment of [11C]PIB PET in patients with cognitive impairment

  • Original Article
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European Journal of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Purpose

The aim of this study was to evaluate the visual assessment of positron emission tomography images of N-[methyl-11C]2-(4′-methylaminophenyl)-6-hydroxybenzothiazole ([11C]PIB) in a patient population with mild to moderate memory impairment or dementia.

Methods

We compared the visual ratings of two readers using kappa statistics and correlated the results of visual and quantitative region of interest (ROI) analyses. The one reader had good experience in evaluating PIB images and the other had little previous experience. The sensitivity and specificity of the visual assessment was determined using quantitative data from 18 healthy controls previously examined: [11C]PIB uptake was considered as abnormal if it was more than 2 SD above the mean of the healthy subjects.

Results

The evaluation of visual classification as “normal” or “abnormal” showed good interobserver agreement (κ = 0.90). There was a clear correlation between visual and quantitative analysis (r = 0.47–0.79, p < 0.001). The most difficult visually assessed brain area was the putamen (κ = 0.11; correlation with quantitative analysis: reader A r = 0.22; reader B r = 0.60).

Conclusion

Our study shows that visual evaluation of [11C]PIB images conforms with quantitative analyses also in a clinical patient population supporting the feasibility of visual evaluation in clinical settings.

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Acknowledgements

The assistance of the personnel of Turku PET Centre is gratefully acknowledged. This study was financially supported by grants from Academy of Finland (project 133193), Sigrid Juselius Foundation and Turku University Hospital (EVO).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Turku PET Centre, P.O. Box 52, 20521, Turku, Finland

    Timo Suotunen, Jussi Hirvonen, Sargo Aalto, Eveliina Arponen, Mika Teräs, Marko Seppänen & Juha O. Rinne

  2. Turku University Hospital, Turku, Finland

    Pirjo Immonen-Räihä & Juha O. Rinne

  3. Department of Psychology, Åbo Academy University, Turku, Finland

    Sargo Aalto

  4. Research Centre of Applied and Preventive Cardiovascular Medicine, University of Turku, Turku, Finland

    Irina Lisinen

  5. Neurologic Outpatient Department, Salo Regional Hospital, Salo, Finland

    Kari Koski

  6. Geriatric Unit, School of Public Health and Clinical Nutrition, University of Kuopio, Kuopio, Finland

    Raimo Sulkava

  7. Kuopio University Hospital, Kuopio, Finland

    Raimo Sulkava

Authors
  1. Timo Suotunen
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  2. Jussi Hirvonen
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  3. Pirjo Immonen-Räihä
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  11. Juha O. Rinne
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Correspondence to Juha O. Rinne.

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Suotunen, T., Hirvonen, J., Immonen-Räihä, P. et al. Visual assessment of [11C]PIB PET in patients with cognitive impairment. Eur J Nucl Med Mol Imaging 37, 1141–1147 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00259-010-1382-8

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00259-010-1382-8

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