CT Principle 3 Flashcards
CT based artifact types
- patient
- physics principles
- hardware
Examples of patient based artifacts
- metallic implants
- motion
- MPR
Examples of hardware based artifacts
- ring artifact
- cone beam artifact
Examples of physic principle based artifacts
- beam hardening
- partial volume
- photon starvation
what artifacts come from beam hardening
streak & cupping artifacts
beam hardening effect
when lower energy photons are absorbed faster than higher energy photons, resulting in a high mean energy and harder beam
how does cupping artifact occur
beam hardens more than expected causing the attenuation profile to differ from ideal profile
how to fix cupping artifact
- higher kVp
- reconstruction algorithm
how does streaking artifacts occur
dark streaks appear between 1/2 very dense objects
how to fix streaking artifact
- metal artifact algorithm
- higher kVp
- remove artifact
what causes metal streak artifacts
- photon starvation
- beam hardening
- scatter
- poison / white noise
how do metal streak artifacts appear
starburst artifact where bright streaks originate from 1 point into nearby structures
how does Poisson noise occur
statistical error of low photon count; random thin streaks along direction of greatest attenuation
how to fix metal artifact from dense dental filling
metal algorithm reconstruction
how do contrast density artifacts occur
non-uniform distribution of contrast agents leading to streaks in tissue enhancement
how to fix contrast density artifact
optimize contrast injection protocol for even distribution with saline flushes to clear contrast from vessels