Comparison of Automated Kidney Stone Size Measurement and Volumetry in Photon Counting CT Compared to 3rd Generation Dual Energy CT and Physically Measurements - an Ex Vivo Study

Overview

Journal World J Urol

Specialty Urology

Date 2024 Jul 22

PMID 39037610

Authors

Tim Nestler

Rico Stoll

Hans Schmelz

Justine Schoch

Albrecht Hesse

Kai Nestler

Kerstin Smolka

Sebastian Faby

Markus Jurgens

Bernhard Schmidt

Katja Spornitz

Daniel Overhoff

Stephan Waldeck

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Purpose: This ex vivo study aimed to compare a newly developed dual-source photon-counting CT (PCCT) with a 3rd generation dual-source dual-energy CT (DECT) for the detection and measurement (stone lengths and volumetrics) of urinary stones.

Methods: 143 urinary stones with a known geometry were physically measured and defined as reference values. Next, urinary stones were placed in an anthropomorphic abdomen-model and were scanned with DECT and PCCT. Images were read by two experienced examiners and automatically evaluated using a specific software.

Results: DECT and PCCT showed a high sensitivity for manual stone detection of 97.9% and 94.4%, and for automatic detection of 93.0% and 87.4%, respectively. Compared to that uric acid and xanthine stones were recognized slightly worse by DECT and PCCT with manual stone detection (93.3% and 82.2%), and with automatic detection (77.8% and 60.0%). All other stone entities were completely recognized. By comparing the maximum diameter of the reference value and DECT, Pearson-correlation was 0.96 (p < 0.001) for manual and 0.97 (p < 0.001) for automatic measurement, and for PCCT it was 0.94 (p < 0.001) for manual and 0.97 (p < 0.001) for automatic measurements. DECT and PCCT can also reliably determine volume manually and automatically with a Pearson-correlation of 0.99 (p < 0.001), respectively.

Conclusion: Both CTs showed comparable results in stone detection, length measurement and volumetry compared to the reference values. Automatic measurement tends to underestimate the maximum diameter. DECT proved to be slightly superior in the recognition of xanthine and uric acid stones.

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