Comparison of image quality of an abdominal acquisition mode of angiography systems from four major manufacturers

Abstract

Objective: The aim of this study was to compare image quality of different abdominal acquisition modes under conditions simulating obese patients whose images suffer more from noise and scatter radiation. Images were acquired in clinically used acquisition modes on the static and dynamic phantom for four angiography systems.

Methods: A LEGO cart with 34 cm of PMMA and Pro-RTG Fluo18 phantom were used to simulate obese patients. The low-contrast resolution was assessed subjectively by two readers and objectively using signal-difference-to-noise ratio (SDNR) and using SDNR to air kerma rate. The line-pair resolution was assessed using the transmitted contrast value for line-pair groups.

Results: Systems use different exposure parameters and dose but they differ in postprocessing too. Qualitative and quantitative assessments of noise produced similar results, images produced by systems A and C were noisier than by systems B and D. Highest SDNR was provided by System B, whilst System A produced the lowest values, which were almost the same for objects with different contrast. The image quality was affected mainly by frame lengths and postprocessing, but also by the dose. The images of the static phantom were better compared to the images of the dynamic phantom, which was an expected result.

Conclusions: It was possible to identify image quality differences and to characterize features of postprocessing from measurements on standardized objects. A potential for optimization on some systems was identified, although further work, including assessment of clinical images, would be needed as part of the optimization process.