title: Investigation of an SFOV hybrid gamma camera for thyroid imaging.
abstract: The Hybrid Compact Gamma Camera (HCGC) is a small field of view (SFOV) portable hybrid gamma-optical camera intended for small organ imaging at the patient bedside. In this study, a thyroid phantom was used to determine the suitability of the HCGC for clinical thyroid imaging through comparison with large field of view (LFOV) system performance. A direct comparison with LFOV contrast performance showed that the lower sensitivity of the HCGC had a detrimental effect on image quality. Despite this, the contrast of HCGC images exceeded those of the LFOV cameras for some image features particularly when a high-resolution pinhole collimator was used. A clinical simulation showed that thyroid morphology was visible in a 5 min integrated image acquisition with an expected dependency on the activity within the thyroid. The first clinical use of the HCGC for imaging thyroid uptake of (123)I is also presented. Measurements indicate that the HCGC has promising utility in thyroid imaging, particularly as its small size allows it to be brought into closer proximity with a patient. Future development of the energy response of the HCGC is expected to further improve image detectability.
authors.affiliation: Space Research Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Leicester, Leicester LE1 7RH, UK. Electronic address: s.bugby@le.ac.uk.
authors.forename: S L
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: Bugby
authors.affiliation: Space Research Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Leicester, Leicester LE1 7RH, UK.
authors.forename: J E
authors.initials: JE
authors.lastname: Lees
authors.affiliation: Radiological Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG7 2UH, UK.
authors.forename: A H
authors.initials: AH
authors.lastname: Ng
authors.affiliation: Space Research Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Leicester, Leicester LE1 7RH, UK; Radiological Sciences Department, College of Applied Medical Sciences, King Khalid University, Postcode: 3665, Zip Code: 16481, Abha, Saudi Arabia.
authors.forename: M S
authors.initials: MS
authors.lastname: Alqahtani
authors.affiliation: Radiological Sciences, School of Medicine, University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG7 2UH, UK.
authors.forename: A C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Perkins
mesh_terms: D003287:Contrast Media / Q000737:chemistry; D003952:Diagnostic Imaging; D004867:Equipment Design; D015902:Gamma Cameras; D006801:Humans; D007091:Image Processing, Computer-Assisted; D007457:Iodine Radioisotopes; D019047:Phantoms, Imaging; D011877:Radionuclide Imaging / Q000379:methods*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013667:Technetium / Q000737:chemistry; D013961:Thyroid Gland / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*
chemical_list: D003287:Contrast Media; D007457:Iodine Radioisotopes; D013667:Technetium
keywords: Image contrast; SFOV gamma camera; Thyroid scintigraphy