American consensus recommendations for gastric scintigraphy: curve fitting with only a few points remains an easy and accurate method to obtain reliable and reproducible gastric emptying estimates.
BACKGROUND
In 2008, American consensus recommendations for performing gastric emptying (GE) scintigraphy were published. It was recommended that data are acquired only at 0, 1, 2, and 4 h and that the results are expressed as percentages of meal retention. Until now, it was established that the GE time-activity curves should have many points (every 10, 15, or 20 min) to reflect the GE process accurately and to be optimally adjusted by a mathematical model. In this study, we have evaluated the curve fitting using only a few points as proposed by the consensus protocol.


METHODS
GE scintigraphy tests of 224 patients were retrospectively analyzed. Two curve fittings were done for each patient, either using data acquired every 20 min or using data acquired every hour. A comparison of these two methods was made based on the values of the computed GE parameters.


RESULTS
We observed strong correlations between the two methods (r=0.81-0.99, P<0.05). Using the Bland-Altman analysis, more than 95% of the differences were included in the mean difference 95% confidence interval. The mean differences were weak with a relatively small SD and Cohen's k coefficients ranging from 0.84 to 0.93, indicating an excellent agreement between the two methods.


CONCLUSIONS
Our results showed the feasibility and accuracy of curve fitting using only a few points. The curve fitting is easy to perform and allows the computation of reliable and reproducible parameters that reflect the whole GE process.
Department of Nuclear Medicine, University Hospital of Brest, Brest, France.
Pierre-Yves
PY
Le Roux
Francis
F
Bouchet
Solène
S
Querellou
Laurent
L
Vervueren
Franck
F
Lacoeuille
Alexandre
A
Turzo
Pierre-Yves
PY
Salaun
Olivier-François
OF
Couturier
D032921:Consensus; D005240:Feasibility Studies; D005260:Female; D005746:Gastric Emptying; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011786:Quality Control; D011877:Radionuclide Imaging / Q000379:methods* / Q000592:standards; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013270:Stomach / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging* / Q000502:physiology*; D014481:United States