TY - JOUR

T1 - Pitfalls in the Path of Quantitative Assessment of the Severity of Oncological Lesions in Diagnostic Nuclear Medicine

AU - Nesterova, A. V.

AU - Denisova, N. V.

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2022, Pleiades Publishing, Ltd.

PY - 2022/5

Y1 - 2022/5

N2 - When examining patients by single-photon-emission computed tomography, the distribution of a radiopharmaceutical in biological tissues is assessed. An active, fast-growing tumor has an increased uptake of the drug compared to healthy tissues. In recent years, a quantitative assessment of the level of intensity of accumulation of a radiopharmaceutical in tumor lesions has attracted significant interest, since it can be useful for monitoring the effectiveness of prescribed therapy. To obtain quantitative results, it is necessary that the applied reconstruction algorithms include the main factors that influence the formation of the initial data. One of these factors is the geometric resolution of the collimator. It was expected that taking this factor into account would improve the quantitative assessment of tumor lesions in reconstructed images. However, there were “pitfalls” on the way to obtaining quantitative estimates of the accumulation of radiopharmaceuticals. So-called edge artifacts were observed on diagnostic images obtained with allowance for the geometric resolution of the collimator, which manifested themselves as a sharp increase in the intensity of radiopharmaceutical accumulation in small tumors and as oscillations in the intensity of radiopharmaceutical accumulation at the edges in large tumors. The problem of marginal artifacts casts doubt on the correctness of the quantitative assessment of the level of intensity of drug accumulation in tumor lesions. In this paper, we study the problem of edge artifacts using the method of mathematical modeling. In numerical experiments, for the first time, the dependence of the quantitative estimate of the intensity of RPs accumulation on the parameters of the reconstruction algorithm was studied.

AB - When examining patients by single-photon-emission computed tomography, the distribution of a radiopharmaceutical in biological tissues is assessed. An active, fast-growing tumor has an increased uptake of the drug compared to healthy tissues. In recent years, a quantitative assessment of the level of intensity of accumulation of a radiopharmaceutical in tumor lesions has attracted significant interest, since it can be useful for monitoring the effectiveness of prescribed therapy. To obtain quantitative results, it is necessary that the applied reconstruction algorithms include the main factors that influence the formation of the initial data. One of these factors is the geometric resolution of the collimator. It was expected that taking this factor into account would improve the quantitative assessment of tumor lesions in reconstructed images. However, there were “pitfalls” on the way to obtaining quantitative estimates of the accumulation of radiopharmaceuticals. So-called edge artifacts were observed on diagnostic images obtained with allowance for the geometric resolution of the collimator, which manifested themselves as a sharp increase in the intensity of radiopharmaceutical accumulation in small tumors and as oscillations in the intensity of radiopharmaceutical accumulation at the edges in large tumors. The problem of marginal artifacts casts doubt on the correctness of the quantitative assessment of the level of intensity of drug accumulation in tumor lesions. In this paper, we study the problem of edge artifacts using the method of mathematical modeling. In numerical experiments, for the first time, the dependence of the quantitative estimate of the intensity of RPs accumulation on the parameters of the reconstruction algorithm was studied.

KW - edge artifacts

KW - mathematical modeling

KW - nuclear medicine

KW - single-photon-emission computed tomography

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85140131889&partnerID=8YFLogxK

UR - https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/6fc15844-5b11-35cb-b400-c2cfaa70c428/

U2 - 10.1134/S1063784222060056

DO - 10.1134/S1063784222060056

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:85140131889

VL - 67

SP - 401

EP - 410

JO - Technical Physics

JF - Technical Physics

SN - 1063-7842

IS - 5

ER -