Investigation of Quality Control in Mammography System Using Phantom in Selected West Bank Health Directorates رسالة ماجستير

Abstract

Quality control in mammography includes simple screening procedures ensuring that the mammography system should operate in accordance with established standards. In West Bank, no studies were found to investigate quality control in the mammography system. There are several types of procedures used to check quality control, such as phantom tools. The main objective of this study is to check the mammographic systems available in selected West Bank health directorates of 12 departments, and to examine the factors affecting the quality of the produced image. The researcher used ACR mammography accreditation phantom to investigate the quality control in mammography system in selected health directorates and interviewed technicians using phantom to assess the device's validity during mammography. This study adopted convenience and, cross-sectional survey, based on data collected from the health directorates mentioned above through examining their mammographic system for a six-month period, in order to check whether its quality affects the image one. Through the study, the researcher concluded that the technicians, working on the mammographic system in these directorates, did not know what the phantom was and have only checked a mammographic system quality in the Directorate of Health in department 1. The researcher also found that there were other factors affecting image quality, such as the processing method, device efficiency, and the technique used, as for image quality across all departments, those who use a CR processing system were found to produce a good quality image. A good imaging system should be able to see three speak groups, four fibers and three masses. On the other hand, directorates using screen films did not produce good quality image and the radiologists could not see the details, so they might repeat the images. Therefore, the researcher recommends that the radiology unit must give instructions for the technicians to calibrate the mammography devices periodically; the engineering unit in the Ministry of Health has to perform maintenance for these devices.