James Brice

In response to demands for evidence that cardiac CT will positively affect patient outcomes, researchers presented results at the RSNA conference Wednesday attesting to its value for identifying which intermediate risk patients are most likely to suffer future catastrophic coronary events.

The 2008 RSNA meeting serves as a reference point of sorts for two important trials testing the clinical efficacy of multislice cardiac CT. Results from the Core64 trials of 64-slice coronary CTA were published Nov. 28 while plans for a Core320 trial were announced in Chicago at the RSNA show.

Most radiologists know about the medical risks associated with patient exposure to ionizing radiation, but many are still in the dark about basic steps they can take to reduce patient exposure. A University of Michigan survey presented at the RSNA meeting found that a surprising percentage were unaware of methods to adjust mA and kVp during CT procedures.

Cohort studies presented in a scientific session Sunday showed progress toward employing coronary CT angiography to evaluate the patency of coronary artery stents.

Results of a three-year trial at Massachusetts General Hospital show that half of patients presenting with chest pain but at low or intermediate risk of acute coronary syndrome can be safely discharged following a negative 64-slice coronary CT evaluation.

President-elect Barack Obama’s appointment of former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle to head the Department of Health and Human Services, combined with a commitment from insurers and a detailed plan from the chair of the powerful Senate Finance Committee, suggests strongly that healthcare reform will be a top priority for the new administration and the 111th Congress.

You can tell by the titles of special focus sessions planned for the 2008 RSNA that program committee chair Dr. Robert M. Quencer sees an opportunity to use the sessions to examine tough issues affecting clinical imaging practice.

There is nothing like a little momentum to help the RSNA organizers present the latest developments in imaging research in the meeting’s scientific sessions. Everyone associated with imaging sciences from Beijing to New York City understands that presenting research in Chicago is an essential requirement for membership in this unique community.

A combined diagnostic approach enhances clinical assessment of heart attack risk, according to a lecture at an American Heart Association conference this week. Such an approach would take into account vulnerable arterial plaques, traditional risk factors, and measures of atherosclerotic disease severity.

A Seattle nonprofit managed care plan has experienced the same rapid growth in high-tech medical imaging utilization as federal health insurance programs.

Change may be the byword for the historic election of Sen. Barack Obama as president, but the type of change Obama will bring to the White House won’t necessarily be accompanied by the uncertainties and anxieties that come with a sharp departure from the past.

The 2009 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule reflects the recent tendency of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to propose stringent reforms for in-office imaging and independent diagnostic imaging facilities in the summer and decide against their implementation when the final MPFS rules are published in the fall.The 2009 Medicare Physician Fee Schedule reflects the recent tendency of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services to propose stringent reforms for in-office imaging and independent diagnostic imaging facilities in the summer and decide against their implementation when the final MPFS rules are published in the fall.

Molecular imaging is maturing as a scientific force in preclinical research and as a mechanism to guide imaging discoveries toward clinical practice.

Outgoing Society of Nuclear Medicine president Dr. Peter Conti proposed at the organization's 2006 meeting that nuclear medicine is synonymous with molecular imaging.

Specialists apply complex analyses, innovative technologies to diagnose life-threatening injuries caused by blows to the head

Other studies confirm value of vertebroplasty, show growing influence of diffusion tensor imaging

Historians may look back on May 8, 2006, as a turning point in the history of molecular imaging. Before then, FDG-PET was chronically tangled in political problems that slowed its entry into the clinical mainstream.

The 2006 meeting of the Academy of Molecular Imaging occupied the middle ground between meetings of its two sister societies, the eminently scientific Society for Molecular Imaging and the clinically oriented Society of Nuclear Medicine.

The 2006 Society for Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance meeting showed that the most productive areas of cardiac MR research are those that exploit the modality's inherent strengths.

Although the globalization of everything from transcription to equipment assembly permeates medical imaging, radiologists need not fear that outsourcing will threaten their jobs, according to Dr. James Thrall, radiologist-in-chief at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Nuclear medicine physicians have suspected since the advent of PET/CT that the hybrid technology would outperform PET or CT for staging cancer. Those suspicions were confirmed Tuesday by a study of 260 patients at the University of Essen, Germany, which showed that PET/CT is substantially more accurate for staging carcinoma than PET or CT alone and PET and CT viewed side by side.

Radiologists can breathe easier about the clinical implications of renal abnormalities that are too small to be characterized on multislice CT. Results of a retrospective multicenter outcome study performed by Dr. Erich K. Lang, director of CT at Tulane University, suggest that their pathological threat is so low that frequent follow-up is not required.

Barium enema fluoroscopy has been the bane of radiological practice and subject of radiologists’ jokes for more than 80 years. Now a meta-analysis, presented Friday at the ECR meeting, criticizes the quality of published medical studies of the technique. Those studies have led to the conclusion that double barium enema exams cannot be recommended as an alternative to colonoscopy for diagnosing colorectal carcinoma.

Radiation exposure has been a dicey issue for researchers developing multislice CT coronary artery imaging. According to critics, MSCT exposes patients to twice as much ionizing radiation as conventional cardiac catheterization.