A Study on the Development of Human Phantom for CT through Material Analysis of Medical 3D Printers

Abstract

In CT, the primary radiation generated from the X-ray tube is irradiated to the tissue through a collimator, and since X-rays are continuously irradiated to the tissue while the X-ray tube rotates 360°, the radiation exposure is very high. However, since the training of CT examination cannot be performed on humans, it must be replaced by a human phantom. However, the types of phantoms are not diverse, and the educational phantoms are expensive, so it is difficult to use them for actual education, and there is a point that is not similar to the human body. Accordingly, it has been reported that phantoms manufactured using 3D printers are widely used and helpful. However, there is no phantom with similar density in CT number and similar only in shape and touch. Therefore, this study tried to solve the insufficient spread of educational phantoms by suggesting a manufacturing method that measures and evaluates filament, which is a material, using a 3D printer to produce a human body model phantom similar to human tissue density. HU results similar to anatomical organs according to the measured CT number results for each filament ABS, TPU-95A, and Nylon measured +40 ~ +60 HU, indicating similar values ​​to Liver and Soft tissue, and Wood fill was +30 HU was measured and it was confirmed that it represents a similar value to Blood, and in the case of Steel, Bronze, and Brass, HU of 3071 was measured and it was measured much higher than the CT number of 1000 HU of bone, so it could not be used as a human tissue phantom. I knew there wasn't. Through this study, CT number according to the density of filament material used in the 3D printer was confirmed, and filaments similar to human tissue CT number were confirmed. In the future, if this study is presented as a basic study and fused to 3D printer research, it is thought that it will be used in various ways.