Artifacts Found During Quality Assurance Testing of Computed Radiography and Digital Radiography Detectors

A series of artifact images, obtained over 5 years of performance testing, of both computed radiography (CR) and integrated digital radiographic X-ray imaging detectors are presented. The images presented are all either flat field or test object images and show artifacts previously either undescribed in the existing literature or meriting further comment. The artifacts described are caused by incorrect flat field corrections, a failing amplifier, damaged detector lines affecting their neighbors, lost information between neighboring detector tiles, image retention, delamination of a detector, poor setup of mechanical movements in CR, suckers damaging a CR plate, inappropriate use of grid suppression software, inappropriate use of a low pass spatial frequency filter, and unsharp masking filters. The causes and significance of the artifacts are explained and categorized as software or hardware related. Actions taken to correct the artifacts are described and explained. This work will help physicists, radiographers, and radiologists identify various image quality problems and shows that quality assurance is useful in identifying artifacts.