A METHOD FOR PRACTICAL EQUALIZATION MAMMOGRAPHY OF THE RADIOGRAPHICALLY DENSE BREAST

It has been shown that equalization radiography can overcome the well-known problem of limited film latitude encountered in mammography of the radiographically dense breast. Current equalization geometries based on single scanning beam (SER) or multiple-beam techniques approach the heat-loading limits of mammographic x-ray sources and require excessively long scan times, The authors have proposed an alternative geometry for equalization mammography, rotary scanning equalization radiography (RSER), which uses a slot beam in a translate-rotate geometry, RSER provides the simplicity of a single-beam geometry while offering improved tube efficiency over multiple-beam geometries, Numerical simulations and a prototype imaging system are used to show that equalized mammograms exhibiting high contrast throughout the breast can be obtained with a large scanning beam translated over the image at only four scanning angles. These results indicate that RSER is an efficient, simple, and practical means of imaging the dense breast.