W. Robeson et al., SUPERPETT 3000 TIME-OF-FLIGHT PET TOMOGRAPH - OPTIMIZATION OF FACTORSAFFECTING QUANTITATION, IEEE transactions on nuclear science, 40(2), 1993, pp. 135-142
All PET tomographs are inherently quantitative imaging tools. However,
to certify that the observed radioactivity in the organ of interest r
epresents true underlying radioactivity concentration, requires an exp
erimental/theoretical treatment of factors such as scatter, randoms, r
econstruction parameters, recovery coefficients and cross-calibration
procedure. We have used dual isotope experiments as an efficient metho
d to check the overall tomograph performance and found that the inclus
ion of a ''real-time'' calibration tube standard in the tomograph fiel
d-of-view during scanning compensates for any temporal variation in th
e machine sensitivity as well as provide a built-in dead time correcti
on. Reconstruction parameters and recovery coefficients were optimized
through phantom experiments. Last but not least, we have shown throug
h human studies that results similar to other head and whole body scan
ners have been achieved with the whole body Superpett 3000 time-of-fli
ght tomograph at North Shore University Hospital.