Diagnostic Reading #32: Five “Must Read” Articles on Medical Imaging

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In the news: CT scans shows how COVID patients are impacted with long-term effects.

This week’s articles in Diagnostic Reading include: CT shows COVID patients have long-term effects; using imaging to increase profitability in orthopaedics, hybrid imaging method enhances diagnoses, reduces follow up; automated MRI labeling; and an increase in emergency CT for minor injuries.

More than 70% of COVID-19 patients develop long-term sequelae – AuntMinnie

More than 70% of patients who contract COVID-19 show thickened lung tissue on chest CT exams performed six months later, according to an article published in Radiology. Additionally, combining clinical data with baseline chest CT exam findings is an effective way to predict which COVID-19 patients are at higher risk of these types of long-term effects, stated the research team. Though chest CT findings for COVID-19 have been examined previously, most have studied the short- and midterm of disease progression.

Increasing profitability in orthopaedics – Everything Rad

There are several strong forces in healthcare that are eroding profitability for orthopaedic providers in large hospital settings. Learn 3 ways that image quality can help attract patients and referrals, and offset price erosion.

Hybrid PET/MRI spares 20% of brain tumor patients from unnecessary follow-up treatment – Health Imaging

A molecular, hybrid imaging approach accurately detects malignant brain tumors while also preventing unnecessary invasive procedures, according to recently published research in the Journal of Nuclear Medicine. Combined PET/MRI scanning with radiopharmaceuticals such as 18F-fluorethyl tyrosine (18F-FET) has proven to enhance diagnostic performance. Research findings reported that 18F-FET PET/MR spotted new malignant tumors with 85% accuracy and prevented 20% of all participants from undergoing unneeded follow-up procedures.

Researchers label more than 100,000 MRI exams in under 30 minutes – Axis Imaging News

Researchers have automated brain MRI image labeling—needed to teach machine learning image recognition models—by obtaining important labels from radiology reports and accurately assigning them to the corresponding MRI examinations. Now, more than 100,000 MRI examinations can be labeled in less than half an hour, which would take years to perform manually, stated researchers in European Radiology.

Emergency CT use for minor spine injuries is on the rise – Diagnostic Imaging

CT use is increasing with patients who have minor injuries, and as a result, emergency departments are seeing more cervical spine imaging, according to a study published in the Journal of the American College of Radiology. Investigators revealed that the number of spine scans have tripled among some groups, and spine injuries account for more than 800,000 of the 40 million scans captured every year in emergency departments nationwide.

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