Activities | The primary charge of this working group is to provide expertise and guidance on the medical physics aspects of the use of diagnostic imaging modalities for quantitative imaging. This WG will leverage the expertise of AAPM members in the physics of diagnostic imaging modalities regarding, but not limited to, image acquisition, image reconstruction, image post-processing, and computer-aided image analyses as they contribute to the uses of quantitative imaging in research and clinical practice. This will not include the discovery or validation of biomarkers themselves but provide the methods to estimate their quantitative magnitude. The expected products of this WGPQI will be the development of guidance documents (name TBD) that provide information on the measurement 'accuracy' (e.g., linearity, bias, variance and other specific measurands as defined previously by organizations such as QIBA and other relevant bodies) for quantitative imaging modalities. The information will include what is known, such as values reported in the literature. If there are gaps in knowledge, that would ideally be reported as well. Information reported will also include specific guidance for image acquisition, reconstruction, post-processing, and analysis, The WGPQI will work within the AAPM with the different modality-specific subcommittees of IPC, For the most part, the WGPQI will also liaise externally with clinical radiology and specialty societies to identify QI applications of interest, which may include, but are not limited to biomarkers of interest for which these recommendations are to be developed. The WGPQI will also work, as relevant, with the Imaging Informatics Subcommittee (IISC) and the Imaging Data Standards and Harmonization Subcommittee (IDSH) on recommendations for the communication and storage mechanisms for quantitative imaging estimations. The WGPQI will also work with system manufacturers to encourage the inclusion of features (e.g., reconstruction kernels) on systems to aid in the image formation process for quantitative estimates and to seek input on the feasibility of the draft recommendations. It is expected that the majority of these recommendations will be developed and published in the form of AAPM Task Group Reports, prepared by Task Groups that are co-parented by the WGPQI and the relevant Subcommittee.
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