Assessment of the Patient Movement for Lesion during Myocardial Perfusion SPECT Imaging by Cardiac Phantom

Movement of the patient during myocardial perfusion SPECT leads to some artifacts that make the interpretation difficult. In this study, myocardial perfusion imaging protocol was performed on a cardiac phantom and SPECT was performed by simulating patient movements. A lesion model with dimensions of 1.2 × 2 × 2 cm was created on the inferoseptal wall of the cardiac phantom. Imaging was done in circular orbits in 64 × 64 matrix and step and shoot mode. First set of images taken with no movement was referred as the reference image. During imaging, patient movement was simulated by moving the phantom in ±X and ±Y directions between the frames starting from 8th frame to 16th frame. At the end of imaging, Bull’s eye maps of images with movement were compared with Bull’s eye maps of reference images. Bull’s eye maps were evaluated by an experienced nuclear medicine physician. Shifting patient’s movement in all directions by ±1 and ±2 cm, displaced the localization of the lesion mildly and this did not hamper the evaluation. However, movements of ±3 or ±4 cm resulted in artifacts which in turn caused partial or no visualization of the lesion. In motion corrected images, the lesion could be evaluated in ±1 and ±2 cm movements while lesion could not be evaluated in ±3 and ±4 cm movements. As a result, movement greater than ±3 cm causes significant image artifacts and this should be considered as a potential source of error in myocardial perfusion studies.