Introduction Hybrid Tomographic Imaging - Correction Techniques in Emission Tomography - page 209

Chapter10
IntroductionHybridTomographic
Imaging
Hartwig Newiger
Siemens Healthcare, Molecular Imaging, Erlangen, Germany
10.1 Introduction :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: 209
10.2 Combining PET and SPECT :::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: 209
10.3 The combination with MR ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: 211
10.4 Combining ultrasound with PET and SPECT :::::::::::::::::: 213
References ::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: 215
10.1 Introduction
When the December 4, 2000 issue of Time magazine listed PET/CT as
one of the key innovations in 2000, it was not obvious that within about four
years nearly 100% of all newly installed PET systems would be PET/CT
devices. But PET/CT, developed by Townsend and his team, has changed
the world of PET forever [1]. The combination of highly specific metabolic
imaging with fine spatial and temporal resolution of the anatomic information
led to enormous improvements in the field of PET imaging (and PET/CT),
providing diagnostic information far beyond the individual results of either
modality (Figure 10.1).
From PET/CT it was only a small step to combine SPECT devices with
diagnostic CT (Figure 10.2) which was introduced commercially in 2004 to
demonstrate its clinical ecacy [7].
Since then, hybrid imaging has become a standard tool in nuclear medicine,
combining functional information with the morphological data sets of diag-
nostic CT.
Some diagnostic questions require the correlation of PET and SPECT
studies with data from other (anatomical) imaging devices beyond CT. Ex-
amples are the combination with MR or ultrasound (US) or the comparison
of PET and SPECT directly [9].
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