Practical reconstruction protocol for quantitative (90)Y bremsstrahlung SPECT/CT

To develop a practical background compensation (BC) technique to improve quantitative (90)Y-bremsstrahlung single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT)/computed tomography (CT) using a commercially available imaging system.

All images were acquired using medium-energy collimation in six energy windows (EWs), ranging from 70 to 410 keV. The EWs were determined based on the signal-to-background ratio in planar images of an acrylic phantom of different thicknesses (2-16 cm) positioned below a (90)Y source and set at different distances (15-35 cm) from a gamma camera. The authors adapted the widely used EW-based scatter-correction technique by modeling the BC as scaled images. The BC EW was determined empirically in SPECT/CT studies using an IEC phantom based on the sphere activity recovery and residual activity in the cold lung insert. The scaling factor was calculated from 20 clinical planar (90)Y images. Reconstruction parameters were optimized in the same SPECT images for improved image quantification and contrast. A count-to-activity calibration factor was calculated from 30 clinical (90)Y images.

The authors found that the most appropriate imaging EW range was 90-125 keV. BC was modeled as 0.53× images in the EW of 310-410 keV. The background-compensated clinical images had higher image contrast than uncompensated images. The maximum deviation of their SPECT calibration in clinical studies was lowest (<10%) for SPECT with attenuation correction (AC) and SPECT with AC + BC. Using the proposed SPECT-with-AC + BC reconstruction protocol, the authors found that the recovery coefficient of a 37-mm sphere (in a 10-mm volume of interest) increased from 39% to 90% and that the residual activity in the lung insert decreased from 44% to 14% over that of SPECT images with AC alone.

The proposed EW-based BC model was developed for (90)Y bremsstrahlung imaging. SPECT with AC + BC gave improved lesion detectability and activity quantification compared to SPECT with AC only. The proposed methodology can readily be used to tailor (90)Y SPECT/CT acquisition and reconstruction protocols with different SPECT/CT systems for quantification and improved image quality in clinical settings.