Assessing heterogeneity of lesion enhancement kinetics in dynamic contrast-enhanced MRI for breast cancer diagnosi

Assessing heterogeneity of lesion enhancement kinetics in dynamic contrast-enhanced MRI for breast cancer diagnosis
A Karahaliou, K Vassiou, N S Arikidis, S Skiadopoulos, T Kanavou, and L
Costaridou
Br J Radiol 2010;83 296-309

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The current study investigates the feasibility of using texture analysis to quantify the heterogeneity of lesion enhancement kinetics in order to discriminate malignant from benign breast lesions. A total of 82 biopsy-proven breast lesions (51 malignant, 31 benign), originating from 74 women subjected to dynamic contrast-enhanced magnetic resonance imaging (DCE-MRI) were analysed. Pixel-wise analysis of DCE-MRI lesion data was performed to generate initial enhancement, post-initial enhancement and signal enhancement ratio (SER) parametric maps; these maps were subsequently subjected to co-occurrence matrix texture analysis.

The discriminating ability of texture features extracted from each parametric map was investigated using a least-squares minimum distance classifier and further compared with the discriminating ability of the same texture features extracted from the first post-contrast frame.

Selected texture features extracted from the SER map achieved an area under receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.922 ± 0.029, a performance similar to post-initial enhancement map features (0.906 ± 0.032) and statistically significantly higher than for initial enhancement map (0.767 ± 0.053) and first post-contrast frame (0.756 ± 0.060) features.

Quantifying the heterogeneity of parametric maps that reflect lesion washout properties could contribute to the computer-aided diagnosis of breast lesions in DCE-MRI

Investigation of the effect of anode/filter materials on the dose and image quality of a digital mammography system based on an amorphous selenium fla

Investigation of the effect of anode/filter materials on the dose and image quality of a digital mammography system based on an amorphous selenium flat panel detector
P Baldelli, N Phelan, and G Egan
Br J Radiol 2010;83 290-295

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A comparison, in terms of image quality and glandular breast dose, was carried out between two similar digital mammography systems using amorphous selenium flat panel detectors.

The two digital mammography systems currently available from Lorad-Hologic were compared. The original system utilises Mo/Mo and Mo/Rh as target/filter combinations, while the new system uses W/Rh and W/Ag. Images of multiple mammography phantoms with simulated compressed breast thicknesses of 4 cm, 5 cm and 6 cm and various glandular tissue equivalency were acquired under different spectral conditions. The contrast of five details, corresponding to five glandular compositions, was calculated and the ratio of the square of the contrast-to-noise ratio to the average glandular dose was used as a figure-of-merit (FOM) to compare results. For each phantom thickness and target/filter combination, there is an optimum voltage that maximises the FOM.

Results show that the W/Rh combination is the best choice for all the detection tasks studied, but for thicknesses greater than 6 cm the W/Ag combination would probably be the best choice. In addition, the new system with W filter presents a better optimisation of the automatic exposure control in comparison with the original system with Mo filter

Advances in mammographic imaging

Advances in mammographic imaging
K J Robson
Br J Radiol 2010;83 273-275

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Breast imaging in the UK is currently undergoing a major change, with the widespread implementation of full-field digital mammography (FFDM) equipment. This article looks at some of the advanced imaging techniques that have become possible following the development of FFDM units. These techniques may prove to be useful additions to standard mammography for some groups of women