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Published in: Magnetic Resonance Materials in Physics, Biology and Medicine 1/2013

01-02-2013 | Research Article

Evaluation of an attenuation correction method for PET/MR imaging of the head based on substitute CT images

Authors: Anne Larsson, Adam Johansson, Jan Axelsson, Tufve Nyholm, Thomas Asklund, Katrine Riklund, Mikael Karlsson

Published in: Magnetic Resonance Materials in Physics, Biology and Medicine | Issue 1/2013

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Abstract

Object

The aim of this study was to evaluate MR-based attenuation correction of PET emission data of the head, based on a previously described technique that calculates substitute CT (sCT) images from a set of MR images.

Materials and methods

Images from eight patients, examined with 18F-FLT PET/CT and MRI, were included. sCT images were calculated and co-registered to the corresponding CT images, and transferred to the PET/CT scanner for reconstruction. The new reconstructions were then compared with the originals. The effect of replacing bone with soft tissue in the sCT-images was also evaluated.

Results

The average relative difference between the sCT-corrected PET images and the CT-corrected PET images was 1.6 % for the head and 1.9 % for the brain. The average standard deviations of the relative differences within the head were relatively high, at 13.2 %, primarily because of large differences in the nasal septa region. For the brain, the average standard deviation was lower, 4.1 %. The global average difference in the head when replacing bone with soft tissue was 11 %.

Conclusion

The method presented here has a high rate of accuracy, but high-precision quantitative imaging of the nasal septa region is not possible at the moment.
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Metadata
Title
Evaluation of an attenuation correction method for PET/MR imaging of the head based on substitute CT images
Authors
Anne Larsson
Adam Johansson
Jan Axelsson
Tufve Nyholm
Thomas Asklund
Katrine Riklund
Mikael Karlsson
Publication date
01-02-2013
Publisher
Springer-Verlag
Published in
Magnetic Resonance Materials in Physics, Biology and Medicine / Issue 1/2013
Print ISSN: 0968-5243
Electronic ISSN: 1352-8661
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10334-012-0339-2

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