Quality and accuracy of cone beam computed tomography gated by active breathing control.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the quality and accuracy of cone beam computed tomography (CBCT) gated by active breathing control (ABC), which may be useful for image guidance in the presence of respiration. Comparisons were made between conventional ABC-CBCT (stop and go), fast ABC-CBCT (a method to speed up the acquisition by slowing the gantry instead of stopping during free breathing), and free breathing respiration correlated CBCT. Image quality was assessed in phantom. Accuracy of reconstructed voxel intensity, uniformity, and root mean square error were evaluated. Registration accuracy (bony and soft tissue) was quantified with both an anthropomorphic and a quality assurance phantom. Gantry angle accuracy was measured with respect to gantry speed modulation. Conventional ABC-CBCT scan time ranged from 2.3 to 5.8 min. Fast ABC-CBCT scan time ranged from 1.4 to 1.8 min, and respiratory correlated CBCT scans took 2.1 min to complete. Voxel intensity value for ABC gated scans was accurate relative to a normal clinical scan with all projections. Uniformity and root mean square error performance degraded as the number of projections used in the reconstruction of the fast ABC-CBCT scans decreased (shortest breath hold, longest free breathing segment). Registration accuracy for small, large, and rotational corrections was within 1 mm and 1 degrees. Gantry angle accuracy was within 1 degrees for all scans. For high-contrast targets, performance for image-guidance purposes was similar for fast and conventional ABC-CBCT scans and respiration correlated CBCT.