An organ-effective modulation for non-contrast chest computed tomography imaging: effect on image quality and thyroid exposure reduction

We investigate the efficacy of organ-effective modulation (OEM) technique for thyroid dose reduction among various body habitus and its impact on image quality in chest non-contrast computed tomography (CT). We prospectively enrolled 64 patients who underwent non-contrast chest CT from January to May 2022. The skin-absorbed radiation dose over the thyroid (D_thyroid) was obtained using a thermoluminescence dosemeter. Signal-to-noise ratio and image noise was also quantitatively assessed. In subjective analyses, two radiologists independently evaluated images based on a 5-point scale. The OEM group showed a markedly decrease in D_thyroid when compared with the non-OEM group (p < 0.05). No significant difference was observed regarding the image noise (p < 0.05), except for the ventral air space. The subjective scores of two radiologists showed no significant differences between the non-OEM and OEM groups. OEM can effectively reduce the radiation exposure of thyroid without compromising on image quality in non-contrast chest CT. (authors)