RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Thallium Lung-to-Heart Quantification: Three Methods of Evaluation
JF Journal of Nuclear Medicine Technology
JO J. Nucl. Med. Technol.
FD Society of Nuclear Medicine
SP 193
OP 195
VO 14
IS 4
A1 Harler, Mary Beth
A1 Mahoney, Moira
A1 Bartlett, Bruce
A1 Patel, Kanta
A1 Turbiner, Elliott
YR 1986
UL http://tech.snmjournals.org/content/14/4/193.abstract
AB Lung-to-heart quantification, when used in conjunction with visual assessment of 201Tl stress test images, has been found useful in diagnosing cardiac dysfunction. We evaluated three methods of quantification in terms of inter- and intraobserver variability and reproducibility. Fifty anterior 201Tl stress images were quantified by each of the following methods: Method A (sum region), which involved one region of interest (ROI) in the measurement of pulmonary activity relative to that of the myocardium; Method B (count density), which required two ROIs, the lung-to-heart ratio being dependent on count density; and Method C (maximum pixel), which used the gray scale of the computer to determine the most intense pixels in the lung field and myocardium. Statistical evaluation has shown that the three methods assess clinical data equally well. Method C was found to be most reproducible in terms of inter- and intraobserver variability (p = 0.0016 and 0.0083), followed by Methods A (p = 0.0026 and 0.0129) and B (p = 0.0038 and 0.0135). Although nearly equivalent in terms of statistics, the three methods possess inherent differences and therefore should not be used interchangeably without conversion factors.