Dear AuntMinnie Member,
Recent headlines got you down? Here's some good news: A new study at this week's American Heart Association meeting indicates that radiologists still have an important role to play in CT cardiac imaging.
Radiology hasn't ceded control of heart CT to cardiologists, but many imaging professionals still worry that things are headed that way. The AHA study, however, implies that cardiologists may still need radiologists to help deal with the many incidental findings discovered during CT angiography studies.
As reported in our Cardiac Imaging Digital Community by staff writer Tracie L. Thompson, a study at Johns Hopkins University found that nearly half of cardiac CTA patients had abnormalities of some sort -- 16% of which were apparently serious.
Interestingly, the study found more noncardiac abnormalities detected by multislice CT than similar, earlier studies that were based on the use of electron-beam CT scanners. You'll find other possible reasons for the discrepancy in our Cardiac Imaging Digital Community, at cardiac.auntminnie.com.
