A positron emission tomography (PET) system comparison utilizing the American College of Radiology Accreditation Phantom

This work utilizes the American College of Radiology (ACR) Positron Emission Tomography (PET) Accreditation Phantom to compare and contrast PET systems utilizing the ACR's testing procedure and evaluation parameters. The ACR PET accreditation test instructions are re-written with step-by-step instructions to facilitate performance of either the "long" or "short" version of the test procedure. Possible errors encountered while completing over sixteen ACR PET accreditation tests during a 14¯-month span are presented along with the specific results of these tests. Each camera model was tested twice at different PET imaging facilities to reduce site specific variations.; Analysis of the measurements indicated that the types of transmission sources appeared to matter less than the transmission source activity; the newer scintillation materials with faster response, GSO and LSO, appear to outperform the BGO and Nat systems; and the full-ring systems outperformed the split-ring systems overall.