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Liver computed tomography with low tube voltage and model-based iterative reconstruction algorithm for hepatic vessel
Bo Yun Hur1, Jeong Min Lee, Ijin Joo
1From the *Department of Radiology, SMG-SNU Boramae Medical Center, Seoul, South Korea; †Department of Radiology, and ‡Institute of Radiation Medicine, Seoul National University Hospital, Seoul, South Korea; §Department of Radiology, Konkuk University Medical Center, Seoul, South Korea.
Objective:
The objective of this study was to investigate the image quality and diagnostic performance of model-based iterative reconstruction (MBIR) for hepatic vessel evaluation on low-tube-voltage (100 kilovolt [peak]) liver computed tomography (CT) for living donors.
Methods:
Fifty-one liver donor candidates (low-kilovolt group) underwent low-tube-voltage CT, which was reconstructed using filtered back projection, adaptive statistical iterative reconstruction, and MBIR. Additional 51 donor candidates who underwent 120-kilovolt (peak) CT using FBP were selected as matching control (standard group). The volume CT dose index, image noise, contrast-to-noise ratios, diagnostic accuracy, and confidence of hepatic vasculatures were evaluated.
Results:
Significant dose reduction was obtained with low-tube-voltage CT. The MBIR images of the low-kilovolt group showed significantly lower image noise and higher contrast-to-noise ratios than did the other image sets (P < 0.001). Regarding diagnostic accuracy and confidence of hepatic vessel anatomic variations with surgical correlation, the MBIR images provided results equivalent to those of other images (P > 0.05).
Conclusions:
Low-tube-voltage liver CT using MBIR may increase image quality and preserve diagnostic performance of hepatic vessel evaluation at reduced radiation dose.
