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Investigation of the quantitative accuracy of low-dose amyloid and tau PET imaging

Radiological Physics and Technology volume 11, pages 451–459 (2018)Cite this article

Abstract

With the increasing incidence of dementia worldwide, the frequent use of amyloid and tau positron emission tomography imaging requires low-dose protocols for the differential diagnoses of various neurodegenerative diseases and the monitoring of disease progression. In this study, we investigated the feasibility to reduce the PET dose without a significant loss of quantitative accuracy in 3D dynamic row action maximum likelihood algorithm-reconstructed PET images using [11C]PIB and [18F]THK5351. Eighteen cognitively normal young controls, cognitively normal elderly controls, and patients with probable Alzheimer’s disease (n = 6 each), were included. Reduced doses were simulated by randomly sampling half and quarter of the full counts in list mode data for one independent realization at each simulated dose. Bias was evaluated between the reduced dose from the full dose of standardized uptake value ratio (SUVR), distribution volume ratio (DVR) from reference Logan, and non-displaceable binding potential (BPND) from simplified reference tissue model (SRTM). DVR yielded the least bias at low dose compared to SUVR and BPND, and thus, is highly recommended. The dose of [18F]THK5351 and [11C]PIB can be reduced to a quarter of the full dose using DVR for evaluation, whereas the dose can only be reduced to half and a quarter of the full dose for [18F]THK5351 and [11C]PIB using SUVR. BPND showed inconsistent trend and large bias at low dose. The feasibility of dose reduction was dependent on the selected parameters of interest, reconstruction algorithms, reference regions, and to a lesser degree by motion effects.

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Acknowledgements

This study was supported by Grants-in-Aid for Scientific Research (B) (No. 17H04118) from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT), Japanese Government.

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Affiliations

  1. Division of Radiation Informatics for Medical Imaging, Graduate School of Biomedical Engineering, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan

    Ying-Hwey Nai & Hiroshi Watabe

  2. Division of Radiation Protection and Safety Control, Cyclotron and Radioisotope Center (CYRIC), Tohoku University, 6-3 Aoba, Aramaki, Aoba-ku, Sendai, Miyagi, 980-8578, Japan

    Ying-Hwey Nai & Hiroshi Watabe

  3. Division of Cyclotron Nuclear Medicine, Cyclotron and Radioisotope Center, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan

    Shoichi Watanuki & Manabu Tashiro

  4. Tohoku Medical and Pharmaceutical University, Sendai, Japan

    Nobuyuki Okamura

Authors
  1. Ying-Hwey Nai
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  2. Shoichi Watanuki
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  3. Manabu Tashiro
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  4. Nobuyuki Okamura
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  5. Hiroshi Watabe
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Correspondence to Hiroshi Watabe.

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No potential conflicts of interest were disclosed.

Statement of human and animal rights

All procedures performed in studies involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the Institutional Review Board of Tohoku University and the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards. This article does not contain any studies performed with animals.

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Written informed consent was obtained before enrolling the subjects in the study.

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Nai, YH., Watanuki, S., Tashiro, M. et al. Investigation of the quantitative accuracy of low-dose amyloid and tau PET imaging. Radiol Phys Technol 11, 451–459 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12194-018-0485-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12194-018-0485-y

Keywords

  • Alzheimer’s disease
  • Tau
  • Amyloid
  • Low dose
  • Positron emission tomography