ABSTRACT
Abstract Objectives: To investigate the diagnostic performance of single-source dual-energy computed tomography (DECT) based on gemstone spectral imaging technology (including Discovery CT750HD and Revolution CT) in patients with suspected feet/ankles gouty arthritis, and evaluate the urate deposition with a novel semi-quantitative DECT scoring system. Methods: A total of 196 patients were consecutively included. Feet and ankles were evaluated in all patients by single-source DECT scan. The 2015 EULAR/ACR criteria were used as the reference for the diagnosis of gout. The sensitivity, specificity, and area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC) of DECT for the diagnosis of gout in the early (≤1 year), middle (1-3 years), and late (> 3 years) disease durations were calculated. Besides, a novel semi-quantitative DECT scoring system was assessed for the measurement of urate deposition, and the correlation between the scores and the clinical and serological data were also evaluated. Moreover, the influences of artifacts on the diagnostic performance of DECT were also determined. Results: The sensitivity, specificity, and AUC of DECT in 196 patients were 38.10, 96.43%, and 0.673 in the early-stage group; 62.96, 100.00%, and 0.815 in the middle-stage group; and 77.55, 87.50%, and 0.825 in the late-stage group, respectively. The overall diagnostic accuracies in the AUC of DECT (Discovery CT750HD and Revolution CT) in the middle and late stages of gout were higher than that in the early stage of gout. Besides, the monosodium urate crystals were deposited on the first metatarsophalangeal joints and ankles/midfeet. Age, the presence of tophus, bone erosion, and disease duration considerably affected the total urate score. No statistical difference in the positive detection of nail artifact, skin artifact, vascular calcification, and noise artifact was found between the case and control groups. Conclusion: DECT (Discovery CT750HD and Revolution CT) showed promising diagnostic accuracy for the detection of urate crystal deposition in gout but had limited diagnostic sensitivity for short-stage gout. Longer disease duration, the presence of tophus, and bone erosion were associated with the urate crystal score system. The artifacts do not remarkably affect the diagnostic performance of DECT in gout.
ABSTRACT
Objective To explore the value of water -based material decomposition images for detection of bone marrow edema (BME)in sacroiliitis with energy spectral CT.Methods The sacroiliac (SI)joints of nine spondyloarthropathy patients with sacroiliitis (the research group)and eight healthy volunteers (the control group) were underwent MRI and energy spectral CT.The mixed energy image of energy spectral CT was reconstructed to be mono energy image.Then,the mono image was divided into water -based image and calcium image by material divid-ed and analyzed software.The SI para -articular marrow region water -calcium relative concentration of research group was compared with that of control group.The BME diagnosis efficiency and optimal water -based concentration of energy spectral CT was analyzed by receiver operating characteristic (ROC)curve.Then,the sensitivity,specificity, positive likelihood ratio and negative likelihood ration were calculated.Results The water -based concentration of BME in research group (1 067.43 ±10.84)g/L was higher than that of control group (1 039.43 ±8.01)g/L(t =-3.14,P =0.003).Meanwhile,the calcium -based concentration of research group (68.98 ±20.53)g/L was not different from control group (78.03 ±26.39)g/L(t =1.88,P =0.066).ROC curve showed that the diagnosis efficiency was medium as the area of under curve was 0.75.When the optimal concentration of water -based was 1 052.00g/L,the diagnosis efficiency was the best.The sensitivity and specificity was 84.00%,62.50% respectively. Conclusion There are reference value and potential clinical value with energy spectral CT water -based concentra-tion detection for diagnosis BME in patients with sacroiliitis.