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Evaluation of attenuation correction in cardiac PET using PET/MR

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Journal of Nuclear Cardiology Aims and scope

Abstract

Background

Simultaneous acquisition Positron emission tomography/magnetic resonance (PET/MR) is a new technology that has potential as a tool both in research and clinical diagnosis. However, cardiac PET acquisition has not yet been validated using MR imaging for attenuation correction (AC). The goal of this study is to evaluate the feasibility of PET imaging using a standard 2-point Dixon volume interpolated breathhold examination (VIBE) MR sequence for AC.

Methods and Results

Evaluation was performed in both phantom and patient data. A chest phantom containing heart, lungs, and a lesion insert was scanned by both PET/MR and PET/CT. In addition, 30 patients underwent whole-body 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose PET/CT followed by simultaneous cardiac PET/MR. Phantom study showed 3% reduction of activity values in the myocardium due to the non-inclusion of the phased array coil in the AC. In patient scans, average standardized uptake values (SUVs) obtained by PET/CT and PET/MR showed no significant difference (n = 30, 4.6 ± 3.5 vs 4.7 ± 2.8, P = 0.47). There was excellent per patient correlation between the values acquired by PET/CT and PET/MR (R 2 = 0.97).

Conclusions

Myocardial SUVs PET imaging using MR for AC shows excellent correlation with myocardial SUVs obtained by standard PET/CT imaging. The 2-point Dixon VIBE MR technique can be used for AC in simultaneous PET/MR data acquisition.

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Abbreviations

PET/MR:

Positron emission tomography/magnetic resonance

PET/CT:

Positron emission tomography/computed tomography

AC:

Attenuation correction

SUV:

Standardized uptake values

LGE:

Late gadolinium enhancement

18F-FDG:

18F-fluorodeoxyglucose

MR-AC:

Magnetic resonance attenuation correction

CT-AC:

Computed tomography attenuation correction

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Disclosure

Research reported in this publication was supported by the Washington University Institute of Clinical and Translational Sciences grant UL1TR000448 from the National Center for Advancing Translational Sciences (NCATS) of the National Institutes of Health (NIH). The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official view of the NIH.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Cardiovascular Disease, Department of Internal Medicine, Washington University in Saint Louis, Campus Box 8086, 660 S. Euclid Avenue, Saint Louis, MO, 63110, USA

    Jeffrey M. C. Lau MD, PhD, S. Sharma & E. Novak

  2. Department of Radiological Sciences, Mallinckrodt Institute of Radiology, Washington University in Saint Louis, Saint Louis, MO, USA

    R. Laforest, H. Sotoudeh, X. Nie, J. McConathy, R. J. Gropler & P. K. Woodard

  3. Siemens Medical Solutions U.S.A, Malvern, PA, USA

    A. Priatna

Authors
  1. Jeffrey M. C. Lau MD, PhD
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  2. R. Laforest
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  3. H. Sotoudeh
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  4. X. Nie
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  5. S. Sharma
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  6. J. McConathy
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  7. E. Novak
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  8. A. Priatna
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  9. R. J. Gropler
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  10. P. K. Woodard
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Jeffrey M. C. Lau MD, PhD.

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A related editorial is forthcoming.

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Lau, J.M.C., Laforest, R., Sotoudeh, H. et al. Evaluation of attenuation correction in cardiac PET using PET/MR. J. Nucl. Cardiol. 24, 839–846 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12350-015-0197-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12350-015-0197-1

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