title: Dose and image quality of electron-beam CT compared with spiral CT.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To examine dose and image quality of electron-beam CT (EBCT) with continuous volume scan versus spiral CT.
  
  
  METHODS
  An EBCT scanner was compared with a spiral CT (SCT) scanner. Three phantoms were used to measure low-contrast resolution, high-contrast resolution, slice width, and dose.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The EBCT scans showed 30% lower high-contrast resolution for most settings. The dose was comparable to that of spiral CT with 3 mm collimation and 76%/106% higher with EBCT for 1.5 mm/6 mm collimation. Low-contrast resolution was comparable to that of spiral CT using 3 mm collimation, slightly worse for 1.5 mm, and bad for 6 mm EBCT collimation (four times higher dose to reach comparable contrast-to-noise ratio).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Significant restrictions were found using EBCT with continuous volume scan. The authors found that 3 mm collimation can yield acceptable high-contrast resolution and good low-contrast resolution compared with spiral CT. The use of 6 mm or 1.5 mm collimation needs to be restricted to selected cases.
authors.affiliation: Department of Clinical Radiology, University Hospital Mannheim, Faculty of Clinical Medicine Mannheim, University of Heidelberg Medical School, Germany.
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Weisser
authors.forename: K J
authors.initials: KJ
authors.lastname: Lehmann
authors.forename: R
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Scheck
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Coppenrath
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Georgi
mesh_terms: D005069:Evaluation Studies as Topic; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D019047:Phantoms, Imaging; D011829:Radiation Dosage; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed / Q000295:instrumentation / Q000379:methods*