Low-Dose Nonenhanced Head CT Protocol for Follow-Up Evaluation of Children with Ventriculoperitoneal Shunt: Reduction of Radiation and Effect on Image Quality

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Children with a shunt for hydrocephalus often undergo multiple fol-low-up head CT scans, increasing the risk for long-term effects of ionizing radiation. The purpose of our study was to evaluate if an unenhanced low-dose head CT could consistently provide acceptable image quality and diagnostic information. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Ninety-two children (mean age, 9 years; range, 8 months to 21 years; 45 boys and 47 girls) with a shunt for hydrocephalus and no clinical evidence of shunt malfunction who were referred for a follow-up nonenhanced head CT were included in the study. All studies were performed on a 4-section multidetector CT. Two CT studies were selected retrospectively for each patient, 1 performed at standard dose (220 mA) and 1 at low dose (80 mAs). Two radiologists independently evaluated and graded both standard-dose and low-dose studies for various image quality parameters. Attenuation and noise levels were measured, and gray-white differentiation and contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) were calculated. RESULTS: Low-dose CT resulted in 63 % mean dose reduction. All low-dose CT scans were diagnos-tically acceptable. Image quality parameters were significantly lower at low dose (P .0001) except for the parameters for streak artifacts (P .46) and need for further imaging (P .47), which wer