Optimization of Technique Factors for Full-Field Digital Mammography and Comparison of Optimized Techniques to Screen-Film Mammography

摘要

This final report presents progress achieved during a four year pre- doctoral traineeship project to determine the optimum techniques for a flat- panel Cesium-iodide silicon-diode full-field digital mammography system and to compare those optimized techniques to screen-film mammography at equal breast doses. This project work has analyzed the effect of technique factor selection (target-filtration, kvp, and mAs) on image contrast and low- contrast lesion detection under the conditions of matched average glandular dose to an optimized film-screen mammography system. Results indicate that low-contrast lesion detection was optimized for full-field digital mammography by using a softer x- ray beam for thin breasts and a harder x-ray beam for thick breasts. Under the constraint of matched average glandular dose between digital and screen-film mammography systems, optimum low-contrast lesion detection with full-field digital mammography was superior to that. for screen-film mammography for all but the thinnest breasts. The results of this project have been published in two journal articles with another manuscript in preparation for submission and five abstracts have been published and presented at scientific meetings.