New technologies to reduce pediatric radiation doses

Abstract

X-ray dose reduction in pediatrics is particularly important because babies and children are very sensitive to radiation exposure. We present new developments to further decrease pediatric patient dose. With the help of an advanced exposure control, a constant image quality can be maintained for all patient sizes, leading to dose savings for babies and children of up to 30%. Because objects of interest are quite small and the speed of motion is high in pediatric patients, short pulse widths down to 4 ms are important to reduce motion blurring artifacts. Further, a new noise-reduction algorithm is presented that detects and processes signal and noise in different frequency bands, generating smooth images without contrast loss. Finally, we introduce a super-resolution technique: two or more medical images, which are shifted against each other in a subpixel region, are combined to resolve structures smaller than the size of a single pixel. Advanced exposure control, short exposure times, noise reduction and super-resolution provide improved image quality, which can also be invested to save radiation exposure. All in all, the tools presented here offer a large potential to minimize the deterministic and stochastic risks of radiation exposure.

Evaluation of the lung in children with suspected pneumonia: usefulness of ultrasonography

“…In addition, in seven cases, the pleural effusion was visible on US only, and the patients were monitored until its complete reabsorption. Thus, 11 additional US examinations were performed, which were not, however, included in toracica mediante un'apparecchiatura ATL HDI 5000 (ATL-Philips, Bothell, USA) mediante sonda convex ad ampia banda (2)(3)(4)(5) MHz) e sonda lineare ad alta frequenza ad ampia banda (5)(6)(7)(8)(9)(10)(11)(12) the statistical analysis because of the lack of a reference standard better than chest radiography. In identifying pleural effusion, US had 100% sensitivity and specificity values.…”

Super-resolution variable-dose imaging in digital radiography: quality and dose reduction with a fluoroscopic flat-panel detector

“…Super-resolution techniques may be applied to a series of low-dose, low-resolution fluoroscopic frames to produce a radiographic image of diagnostic quality [3][4][5][6]. The super-resolution process requires a three-phase process (image registration with subpixel shifting, image fusion, and then deblurring) in order to produce the final SR-Radiograph (Fig.…”

“…Initial work in the application of super-resolution in radiography utilized conventional image intensifiers [3][4][5][6], while the work herein presents our initial experience utilizing a dynamic flat-detector (FD) imaging sensor that is capable of fluoroscopy, for super-resolution digital radiography. The aim of the study was to demonstrate and evaluate SR-Radiographs (phantoms and an anatomic example of one body region) to discuss both the possible benefits of FD technology as it pertains to SR-Radiography; to provide for demonstration purposes several patient-derived SR-Radiographs; and to suggest practical applications of this variable-dose radiography technique.…”

Application of Contrast Improvement Methods for Corpulent Patients Undergoing Chest Screening

“…But the optimal choice of technical parameters during the performing of high potential technique, with additional aluminum and copper filters, proper focus to film distance and air gap method application were demonstrated to be much more effective in reducing the exposure dose compared to anti-scatter grid application [3,4,5]. Other methods which allow the improvement of digital image contrast without dose increase include noise reduction algorithm and super-resolution technique [6]. In addition, the visibility of the pathological structure in the digital X-ray image can be improved by a post processing [7,8,9,10].…”