CT

The use of head CT scans in the emergency department varies widely depending on who the attending doctors are when patients arrive.

A CMS quality measurement for use of CT scans on emergency department patients with atraumatic headaches is not reliable, researchers found.

Computerized tomographic colonography (CTC), or virtual colonoscopy, is just as accurate as standard colonoscopies in detecting cancer and precancerous polyps in people aged 65 years and older.

Use of CT/CT angiography, often more readily available than MRI, after a transient ischemic attack or minor stroke predicts risk of recurrent stroke and clinical outcome.

The Aquilion Prime CT was designed for facilities that need to perform a wide variety of advanced clinical exams and produce high-quality clinical images with reduced radiation exposure, the company said.

Iodinated contrast media during imaging procedures is associated with changes in thyroid function and increased risk of developing hyperthyroidism, researchers found.

A follow-on CT scan can help lower risks of brain hemorrhage for patients with minor head injuries who are taking the anticoagulant warfarin, according to a study published online this week in the Annals of Emergency Medicine.

Medical device manufacturer NinePoint Medical Inc. has received FDA 510 (k) clearance for its volumetric optical coherence tomography (OCT) imaging system.

Once limited to research and use by eye specialists, optical coherence tomography (OCT) is emerging as a major imaging modality. OCT is more sensitive than ultrasound, experts said, and now researchers and clinicians are now finding ways to use OCT to guide esophageal and cervical biopsies.

The use of clinical decision support in the emergency room cuts the need for CT pulmonary angiography for acute pulmonary embolism by 20 percent and boosts yield 69 percent, according to a study published online on Dec. 20 in the journal Radiology.

WellPoint’s decision earlier this month to cover CT scans for heavy smokers may encourage other insurers to follow suit, paving the way for imaging sites to set up screening programs. But, for now, payers and practices alike are waiting to see what happens next.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved the first handheld device to detect intracranial hematomas - bleeding in the skull - which the agency says can help determine if patients with critical injuries need an immediate CT scan.

While providers are paying special mind in lowering radiation dose through prep work and process improvements, they do have their opinions on which CT vendors are the low dose leaders, according to a new report from KLAS, CT 2011: Focused on Dose.

Siemens’ computed tomography (CT) iterative reconstruction protocol has been cleared by the FDA, the company announced Wednesday.

Patients voting with their feet strongly preferred noninvasive CT colonography over traditional colonoscopies, Dutch researchers have found.

Coronary artery calcification (CAC) scores of zero don’t give patients a pass from obstructive coronary artery disease, according to a study using coronary computed tomography angiography (CCTA) on patients with symptoms of coronary artery disease.

Scott Smith, director of project management, CT, Philips Healthcare, describes low-dose CT as nearly a given in the marketplace now. What’s more important is maintaining the speed and quality of the image while using iterative reconstruction to keep the dose low.

Agreement is lacking - both across institutions and within departments - for the management of six commonly encountered incidental findings on body CT, concludes a study in the November issue of the Journal of the American College of Radiology. Departments should develop guidelines to ensure consistent patient recommendations, authors said.

New custom-designed patient shielding devices should supplant traditional lead aprons for chest CT scans - and possibly every scan, regardless of body part. That’s according to the authors of a new study published in the British Journal of Radiology.

CT angiography works as well as conventional digital subtraction angiography for diagnosing peripheral arterial disease (PAD), researchers reported online in the journal Radiology.

Heavy smokers screened for lung cancer with low-dose helical CT scans had a 20 percent lower mortality risk than those screened with standard X-ray, according to a large scale study recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine. So should the lung cancer screening policy change?

Radiologists have been struggling to balance image noise with radiation dose in computed tomography (CT) scans for decades. But the competition just went up a notch (or perhaps many notches) with the recent FDA approval of GE Healthcare’s Model Based Image Reconstruction (MBIR) technology, Veo. While MBIR is the most recent of the iterative reconstruction technologies, top manufacturers offer their own software answers to the noise versus dose argument.

Radiologists can boost patient safety without significantly affecting the quality of the images by cutting the dose of contrast media in coronary CT angiography, according to a new study in the American Journal of Roentgenology.

Careful consideration of CT scanning protocols can cut breast radiation burden by 50 percent, according to a new study in the American Journal of Roentgenology.

Adenosine stress 128-slice dual source computed tomography perfusion imaging (CTP) with a high pitch factor appears to provide faster, more accurate heart scans for both viewing blood vessels in the heart and measuring blood supply to the heart muscle - while exposing patients to less radiation, researchers report in Circulation: Cardiovascular Imaging, a journal of the American Heart Association.

Coronary artery calcium (CAC) scores based on cardiac CT scans can stratify the risk of heart disease among those without symptoms, a new study reports.

A study assessing CT angiographs of nearly 25,000 patients presumed to be free of coronary artery disease (CAD) has shown both obstructive and nonobstructive forms of the disease to increase the risk of death.

Increasing use of CT scanning in emergency departments has corresponded with fewer hospital admissions, according to a new study published online in the Annals of Emergency Medicine.

Optical Coherence Technology (OCT), a favored tool of eye specialists for nearly two decades, may soon be coming to an esophagus or colon near you.