Investigation of normal ranges for left ventricular ejection fraction in cardiac gated blood pool imaging studies using different processing workstations.

Background: An investigation has been undertaken to calculate normal ranges for left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) measured by the gated blood pool (GBP) technique. A common set of normal studies was used at 11 hospitals within the south of England to assess the variability of results and normal ranges.

Methods: Normal studies were identified by retrospective review of patients who had undergone a GBP study and echocardiogram at the Royal United Hospital, Bath.

Development of a combined audiovisual and extremity dose monitoring software tool for use in nuclear medicine.

Objectives: Conventional extremity dose monitoring in nuclear medicine, using thermoluminescent dosimeters, provides a convenient method of determining integral doses from a series of procedures. Although semiconductor extremity probes are able to add time information and allow doses from individual procedures to be determined, it can be difficult to relate individual operations to the dose-time curve. Solutions to this problem have been identified and developed.

Comparison of different methods of DatSCAN quantification.

Background: The quantification of DaTSCAN images can be used as an adjunct to visual assessment to differentiate between Parkinson's syndrome and essential tremor. Many programs have been written to assess the relative uptake in the striatum.

Aim: To compare two of the commercially available programs: QuantiSPECT, which analyses isolated data in two dimensions, and BRASS, which performs three-dimensional processing referencing a normal image template.

Variation of DaTSCAN quantification between different gamma camera types.

Objective: To acquire data from a 123I filled Alderson phantom on different gamma cameras types and compare the relative uptake results from processing using the QuantiSPECT program (GE Healthcare).

Methods: A DaTSCAN phantom was filled using the standard protocol and imaged on seven different gamma camera types and on two identical cameras of the same type. The standard GE Healthcare protocols for the given cameras were used.