Related Experiment Video
Updated: Aug 26, 2026
Hybrid PET/MRI Imaging of Alzheimer's Disease Based on 18F-AV-1451
Published on: April 18, 2025
Three-dimensional stereotactic surface projection of brain perfusion SPECT improves diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease
Norinari Honda1, Kikuo Machida, Tohru Matsumoto
1Department of Radiology, Saitama Medical Center, Saitama Medical School, Kawagoe, Japan. norihnd@saitama-med.ac.jp
Objectives:
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is diagnosed by either inspection of the brain perfusion SPECT, or three-dimensional stereotactic surface display (3D-SSP). The purpose was to compare diagnostic performances of these methods.
Methods:
Sixteen nuclear medicine physicians independently interpreted 99mTc-ECD SPECT in one session and SPECT with 3D-SSP in another session without clinical information for 50 studies of AD patients and 40 studies of healthy volunteers. Probabilities of AD were reported according to a subjective scale from 0% (normal) to 100% (definite AD). Receiver operating characteristics curves were generated to calculate areas under the ROC curves (Az's) for the inspection as well as for an automated diagnosis based on a mean Z value in the bilateral posterior cingulate gyri in a 3D-SSP template.
Results:
Mean Az for visual interpretation of SPECT alone (0.679 +/- 0.058) was significantly smaller than that for visual interpretation of both SPECT and 3D-SSP (0.778 +/- 0.060). Az for the automated diagnosis (0.883 +/- 0.037) was significantly greater than that for both modes of visual interpretation.
Conclusions:
3D-SSP enhanced performance of the nuclear medicine physicians inspecting SPECT. Performance of the automated diagnosis exceeded that of the physicians inspecting SPECT with and without 3D-SSP.