Analysis of dual-source CTcoronary angiography of congenital heart disease in children

：Objective To analyze theimage quality of coronary arteries by dual-source computed tomography (DSCT) in childrenwith congenital heart disease(CHD). Methods Image quality of coronary arteries were scoredby two radiologists with an ordinal grading system. Score 3 or 4 was considered to be goodimage quality and diagnostic. Score differences among 3 groups of various baseline heartrate levels, 3 groups of various age levels and 4 coronary branches were analyzed by usingANOVA. Multiple linear regression analysis was used to test the effects of age, heartrate, tube voltage, tube current, pitch, contrast volume, contrast injection rate on thecoronary image scores. Results A total of 72 consecutive patients were enrolled. 71.2%(205/288) of coronary artery branches was good enough for diagnosis. Image quality of leftmain coronary artery (LM, score 3.64±0.49), left anterior descending (LAD, score 2.97±0.40),right coronary artery (RCA, score of 2.82±0.70), left circumflex (LCX, score 2.76±0.73)were in a descending order (F=29.00, P 1--3 years old (2.81±0.74), >3--14 years old (3.58±0.52) werein an ascending order (F= 20.16,P 150 bpm (2.81±0.63) were in adescending order (F=16.72, P<0.01). Multiple linearregression analysis demonstratedthat multiple impact factors affected image quality of LM, LAD, LCX and RCA. Age(r=0.013,P<0.01)and contrast volume(r=0.292, P<0.01)had positive correlation with LM score.Age(r=0.509, P<0.01) and voltage (r=0.292, P=0.011) had positive correlation with LADscore. Heart rate(r= -0.179, P<0.05) had negative correlation with LAD score. Age(r=0.063, P< 0.01) had negative correlation with LCX score. Age (r=0.486,P<0.01) andvoltage (r=0.220, P<0.05) had positive correlation with RCA score. ConclusionsDual-source CT could clearly shows coronary arteries of children with CHD over the age of3 or with heart rate less than 100 bpm. Limitations of Dual-source CT coronary angiographyfor CHD children included young age and fast heart rate.