New Trends in Camera and Software Technology in Nuclear Cardiology
Section snippets
New ultrafast cameras
Several manufacturers have begun to break away from the conventional SPECT imaging approach to create innovative designs of dedicated cardiac scanners. In all of these designs, all available detectors are constrained to imaging just the cardiac field of view. Fig. 2 shows how eight detectors surrounding the patient are all simultaneously imaging the heart. These new designs vary in the number and type of scanning or stationary detectors and in whether NaI or cadmium zinc telluride (CZT) solid
Rotating camera developments
In addition to the radically new camera designs described previously, other manufacturers and investigators have modified the electronics, system geometry, or collimation to significantly improve the imaging performance of rotating SPECT cameras.
Faster acquisition via image reconstruction advancements
The time of acquisition of an MPI study depends on the resolution required to resolve perfusion defects in the myocardium above the inherent noise due to limited count sensitivity. The resolution and sensitivity of parallel-hole collimators depends on the shape, length, and size of the holes. Each hole in the collimator restricts the photons that may strike the crystal to those that originate within the arc φ. Lengthening the holes of the collimator reduces φ and the area exposed through each
Fast-speed myocardial perfusion imaging: clinical implications
The camera design and software improvements reviewed in this article result in a reduction of acquisition time for MPI ranging from half of the conventional acquisition time to a minimum 2-minute acquisition. Clinically, these fast acquisitions would allow flexibility of acquisition protocols, reducing camera and patient total time and cost and increasing patient comfort.28 Reduced acquisition times would also lead to decreased patient motion which results from translation, smearing, and
Summary
Dedicated cardiac SPECT imagers are undergoing a profound change in design for the first time in 50 years. The Anger camera general purpose design is being replaced with systems with multiple detectors focused on the heart, yielding five to ten times the sensitivity of conventional SPECT. Some of the designs also replace the NaI(Tl) crystal with solid state CZT electronic detectors with superior energy resolution. There are also significant innovations in reconstruction software incorporated
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2016, Cardiology ClinicsCitation Excerpt :By their nature, IR techniques allow to model the geometry of the specific imaging system being used and the physics of the emission/detection processes as a means of compensating for the inherent loss in spatial resolution. These are called RR techniques.6–11 Specific information about the characteristics of the detector, the collimator, the patient position with respect to the detector, and the orbit shape are necessary for the proper implementation of RR techniques.
Proceedings of the cardiac PET summit meeting 12 may 2014: Cardiac PET and SPECT instrumentation
2015, Journal of Nuclear CardiologyAdvances in Software for Faster Procedure and Lower Radiotracer Dose Myocardial Perfusion Imaging
2015, Progress in Cardiovascular DiseasesCitation Excerpt :This increase in count sensitivity may be used to improve efficiency, reduce the radiation injected dose or a trade-off between the two. Many excellent reviews of these hardware advances have been published.7–10 In contrast to hardware advances in camera design, this article is dedicated to software advances.
Advances in cardiac processing software
2014, Seminars in Nuclear MedicineCitation Excerpt :The new software methods described later will help us achieve this goal by providing the ability to maintain or improve SPECT image quality with the lower image counting statistics associated with significantly decreased injected radiopharmaceutical doses. There have been several comprehensive reviews and editorials published highlighting innovations in cardiac SPECT software used alone or in combination with new hardware techniques.5-11 The present article should serve to update and reinforce the importance and clinical significance of these technical advancements.
Cumulative radiation dose from medical imaging in chronic adult patients
2013, American Journal of Medicine
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Dr. Garcia is the principal investigator of a research effort funded by GE Healthcare to evaluate the ultrafast cardiac camera described in this article. Emory University also has received funding to evaluate the CardiArc device described in this article. Both Drs. Garcia and Faber are consultants and shareholders of Syntermed which at this time is pursuing a business venture with Eagle Heart Imaging, developers of the 18 multi-pinhole SPECT imaging approach described herein.