Optimisation of imaging protocols in interventional cardiology: impact on patient doses

The purpose of this work is to evaluate the impact of the imaging protocol as part of the
optimisation of patient doses in interventional cardiology. This paper reports the results of an
initial study to refine the existing fluoroscopy and cine settings, evaluates a new imaging protocol
by measuring the image quality and phantom entrance air kerma values, and tests the clinical
implementation of the new protocol in terms of the reduction in patient doses and the impact on
clinical images. The initial study developed a new fluoroscopy mode using 7.5 frames s −1 (instead
of the previous 15 frames s −1 ) with a similar dose/frame and a reduction of approximately 26% in
dose/frame for the existing standard cine mode. For the new imaging protocol, the reduction in
entrance air kerma was characterised for water depths of 16, 20, and 24 cm and the image quality was
evaluated using a Leeds test object. A reduction in dose of around 50% was observed for the low
fluoros...

Source: Journal of Radiological Protection - July 27, 2017 Category: Physics Authors: J M Ordiales, E Vano, J M Nogales, J Ramos, J R L ópez-Mínguez, G Martínez, P Cerrato and F J Álvarez Source Type: research