title: Clinical high resolution skeletal single photon emission tomography using a triple-headed gamma camera.
abstract: Planar skeletal scintigraphy has become established as a standard diagnostic test performed within the nuclear medicine department. Since the 1970s good quality images have been produced using an Anger gamma camera and 99Tcm-labelled diphosphonates. Single photon emission tomography (SPET) has improved the sensitivity of detection and the ability to localize bony pathology, particularly benign bone disease in the spine. Recently multi-detector gamma cameras dedicated to SPET have become available. One such system, the Toshiba GCA-9300A, has been used to perform routine clinical skeletal SPET in 81 patients. Good quality images have been obtained using an 8 min acquisition in the axial skeleton and a 16 min acquisition protocol in the peripheral skeleton. Multiple sites can be tomographed in the same patient during the same examination using two or more 8 min acquisitions. Such a multi-detector gamma camera offers advantages over the standard single-headed rotating camera for skeletal SPET in terms of both imaging time and image quality. A cost analysis was performed which demonstrated that the additional cost of purchasing such a multidector gamma camera was less than 30.00 pounds per SPET study.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Nuclear Medicine, University College London Medical School, UK.
authors.forename: J R
authors.initials: JR
authors.lastname: Buscombe
authors.forename: C E
authors.initials: CE
authors.lastname: Townsend
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Kouris
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Clarke
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Mahmood
authors.forename: P H
authors.initials: PH
authors.lastname: Jarritt
authors.forename: P J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Ell
mesh_terms: D001859:Bone Neoplasms / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D001842:Bone and Bones / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D005269:Femur / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D005528:Foot / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D015902:Gamma Cameras; D006801:Humans; D007719:Knee Joint / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D008159:Lumbar Vertebrae / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D013909:Thorax / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D015899:Tomography, Emission-Computed, Single-Photon / Q000191:economics / Q000295:instrumentation*