Abstract
Purpose: To evaluate the reliability of quantitation of myocardial viability on cardiac F-18 fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) positron emission tomography (PET) scans with three different methods of visual scoring system, autoquantitation using commercially available autoquantitation software, and infarct-size measurement using histogram-based maximum pixel threshold identification on polar-map in rat hearts. Methods: A myocardial infarct (MI) model was made by left anterior descending artery (LAD) ligation in rat hearts. Eighteen MI rats underwent cardiac FDG-PET-computed tomography (CT) twice within a 4-week interval. Myocardium was partitioned into 20 segments for the comparison, and then we quantitated non-viable myocardium on cardiac FDG PET-CT with three different methods: method A-infarct-size measurement using histogram-based maximum pixel threshold identification on polar-map; method B-summed MI score (SMS) by a four-point visual scoring system; method C-metabolic non-viable values by commercially available autoquantitation software. Changes of non-viable myocardium on serial PET-CT scans with three different methods were calculated by the change of each parameter. Correlation and reproducibility were evaluated between the different methods. Results: Infarct-size measurement, visual SMS, and non-viable values by autoquantitation software presented proportional relationship to each other. All the parameters of methods A, B, and C showed relatively good correlation between each other. Among them, infarct-size measurement (method A) and autoquantitation software (method C) showed the best correlation (r = 0.87, p < 0.001). When we evaluated the changes of non-viable myocardium on the serial FDG-PET-CT- however, autoquantitation program showed less correlation with the other methods. Visual assessment (method B) and those of infarct size (method A) showed the best correlation (r = 0.54, p = 0.02) for the assessment of interval changes. Conclusions: Commercially available quantitation software could be applied to measure the myocardial viability on small animal cardiac FDG-PET-CT scan. This kind of quantitation showed good correlation with infarct size measurement by histogram-based maximum pixel threshold identification. However, this method showed the weak correlation when applied in the measuring the changes of non-viable myocardium on the serial scans, which means that the caution will be needed to evaluate the changes on the serial monitoring.
Original language | English |
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Pages (from-to) | 104-114 |
Number of pages | 11 |
Journal | Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging |
Volume | 47 |
Issue number | 2 |
DOIs | |
Publication status | Published - 2013 Jun |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:This study was partly supported by Korea University Intramural Research Grants (2011-K1131781 and 2011-K1132941)
Keywords
- Autoquantitation
- FDG PET
- Myocardial infarct model
- Myocardial viability
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- Radiology Nuclear Medicine and imaging