Time Efficiency and Diagnostic Accuracy of New Automated Myocardial Perfusion Analysis Software in 320-Row CT Cardiac Imaging

ABSTRACT

OBJECTIVE: We aimed to evaluate the time efficiency and diagnostic accuracy of automated myocardial computed tomography perfusion (CTP) image analysis software. MATERIALS AND METHODS: 320-row CTP was performed in 30 patients, and analyses were conducted independently by three different blinded readers by the use of two recent software releases (version 4.6 and novel version 4.71GR001, Toshiba, Tokyo, Japan). Analysis times were compared, and automated epi- and endocardial contour detection was subjectively rated in five categories (excellent, good, fair, poor and very poor). As semi-quantitative perfusion parameters, myocardial attenuation and transmural perfusion ratio (TPR) were calculated for each myocardial segment and agreement was tested by using the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). Conventional coronary angiography served as reference standard. RESULTS: The analysis time was significantly reduced with the novel automated software version as compared with the former release (Reader 1 4308 +/- 1139 min vs. 0947 +/- 0451 min, Reader 2 4207 +/- 0644 min vs. 0942 +/- 0250 min and Reader 3 2138 +/- 344 min vs. 0734 +/- 0212 min; p or = 0.75) for myocardial attenuation in 93% and for TPR in 82%. Diagnostic accuracy for the two software versions was not significantly different (p = 0.169) as compared with conventional coronary angiography. CONCLUSION: The novel automated CTP analysis software offers enhanced time efficiency with an improvement by a factor of about four, while maintaining diagnostic accuracy.