Keywords:
Gastrointestinal tract, CT, Colonography CT
Authors:
P. Vagli, L. Faggioni, E. Picano, R. Scandiffio, A. Mantarro, P. Bemi, L. Cini, E. Neri, C. Bartolozzi; Pisa/IT
DOI:
10.1594/ecr2011/B-326
Methods and Materials
We retrospectively evaluated 13 patients (polyps enriched),
whom underwent CTC and resulted positive for small polyps confirmed by conventional colonoscopy.
Each examination had been evaluated with and without electronic cleansing,
in a total of 26 datasets,
and in supine and prone position,
than in a total of 52 observations.
Patients underwent a three-day non- cathartic preparation followed by a same day fecal tagging protocol (500ml of water and 50 ml of diatrizoate dimeglumine 3-4 hours before CTC).
Images were processed by a novel bowel cleansing plug in embedded in the pre-existent software ColonVCAR 4.5 (GE Medical Systems,
Milwaukee,
WI).
Two radiologists experienced in CTC,
unaware of conventional colonoscopy findings,
analyzed CTC datasets in 2D mode with and without digital bowel cleansing.
CTC image quality (in terms of diagnostic yield and severity of digital subtraction artifacts) was assessed before and after cleansing in consensus on a per-segment basis through a five-point scale (1=poor,
2=fair,
3=good,
4= very good,
5=excellent).
Data was expressed as mean +/- standard deviation (p<0.05 indicates statistical significance).
3D images were classified in diagnostic or non diagnostic before and after cleansing and the improvement of diagnostic yield of 3D cleansed images was assessed.