Simulation and experimental study of respiratory motion effect on image quality of single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT)

Abstract

The effect of respiratory motion on the image quality of single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) was investigated by computer simulation and experimentation. In the computer simulation, the phantom was assumed to be cylindrical with a uniform background and a spherical cold or hot spot. To simulate respiratory motion, a cyclic linear motion parallel to the axis of rotation of a gamma camera was assumed. The contrast in the transaxial images was calculated for various respiratory amplitudes and its dependence on lesion size and object contrast was investigated. In the experiments, a moving phantom was used to simulate respiratory motion. The simulation and the experimental results were in good agreement within the range of statistical error. The effect on the lesion detectability was investigated using receiver operating characteristics (ROC) analysis, and a method for correcting respiratory motion was devised.

Effect of respiratory motion on quantitative myocardial gated SPECT: a simulation study

“…The respiration artefact is a well known source of error in the quantification of the GSPECT images [15]. GSPECT is used to assess the myocardial perfusion and function and the respiratory motion potentially affects both types of quantifications [16,17]. It is already shown that changes in the attenuation due to movement of the heart and diaphragm during respiration may cause lower count density in inferior wall [6,18] that may be augmented by abdominal activity distribution [19].…”

Impact of respiratory motion on the detection of small pulmonary nodules in SPECT imaging

“…Respiratory motion is known to cause artifacts and decrease the tumor detectability in medical imaging [1,2]. In some imaging modalities it is possible to acquire a complete study of the chest during a single breath hold.…”

The imaging of small pulmonary nodules

“…The images of the whole thorax is impractical which requires multiple breathhold sets of contiguous spiral scans to cover the thorax completely with single-detector row CT (10). Respiratory motion is known to cause artifacts, which decrease tumor detectability, and alter quantification of localization in medical imaging (11)(12)(13). The radiologists' variable experience and perception capacity also greatly influence the accuracy of detection (14).…”