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OBJECTIVE. The purpose of our study was to compare aortic CT angiography performed at a low tube voltage and reduced dose of contrast material with standard-voltage, standard-contrast-dose CT angiography.

SUBJECTS AND METHODS. We evaluated 74 patients for aortic disease on MDCT angiography (collimation, 16 × 1.5 mm; beam pitch, 0.9). In 36 patients, we used the standard tube voltage (120 kVp) and a contrast dose of 100 mL (300 mg I/mL) (protocol 1), and in the remaining 38 patients we applied a reduced tube voltage (90 kVp) and a contrast dose of 40 mL (300 mg I/mL) (protocol 2). The patients' weights, CT attenuation of the aorta, visualization of the celiac axis and renal artery, and graininess and streak artifacts on transverse CT scans were evaluated and recorded for each data set. The signal-to-noise ratio (SNR) and contrast-to-noise ratio (CNR) were also measured. For statistical analysis …