Purpose
To assess evaluability and image quality of low-kV computed tomography angiography (CTA) of the thoracic aorta with contemporary evaluation of coronary arteries using 160 mm detector coverage and low dose contrast medium
Methods and Materials
50 patients referred to our hospital for CTA of the thoracic aorta were enrolled in the study and underwent CT with 80 kV,
new adaptive statistical iterative reconstruction algorithm- V,
using 50 ml of contrast medium.
Image quality was assessed using a semi quantitative four-point Likert scale,
by two independent readers.
For each patient,
attenuation,
image noise,
contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) and effective dose (ED) were measured.
Contextually for each patients the coronary tree was evaluated.
Results
No exams were classified as not diagnostic.
Mean aortic attenuation for ascending aorta,
aortic arch and descending aorta were 700.6±119.0,
669.6±106.5 and 665.6±123.07 HU respectively.
Mean image noise and CNR for ascending aorta,
aortic arch and descending aorta were 38.5±6.9,
35.05±7,1 and 36.9±9.1 respectively and 17.1±3,3,
17.6±2.0 and 16.8±2.5 respectively.
389 out of 600 coronary segments were classified as good image quality.
Coronary evaluability (number of coronary segments evaluable/total number of coronary segments) in a segment-based model,
was 89% (535/600 segments).
Mean ED was 1.08±0.1...
Conclusion
80 kV MDCTA of the thoracic aorta using 160 mm detector coverage allows low dose,
good quality exams with complementary coronary tree evaluation.
