Dear AuntMinnie Member,
Are physicians ordering too many percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) procedures, based on their inaccurate interpretation of diagnostic angiography exams?
That's the implication of a new study we're highlighting this week from JAMA Internal Medicine. Researchers from China compared physician interpretations of angiography studies with the results of a quantitative coronary angiography software application that was considered to be the gold standard.
The result? The physician interpretations overestimated the severity of coronary stenosis by 16 percentage points, compared with the software.
The difference isn't just semantic. The researchers believe the phenomenon could be leading to too many patients being sent on for coronary revascularization when they could be managed with either observation or medication. Read more by clicking here for an article in our Imaging Leaders Community.
Don't leave the community without checking out this story on how the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force has rejected a proposal to add new nontraditional risk factors such as coronary artery calcium to traditional models like the Framingham risk score. The task force said there wasn't enough research to support their addition.
CMS on ICDs in MRI
In case you missed it, the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) on Thursday proposed relaxing its rules on the reimbursement of MRI scans for patients with older implantable devices including pacemakers and cardioverter defibrillators (ICDs). Under the new policy, CMS will no longer require claims for these scans to be submitted as part of a clinical trial. Read more by clicking here.
Also in our MRI Community, check out this article on how the combination of brain MRI with artificial intelligence could help physicians identify which infants with hearing loss might be the best candidates for cochlear implants. And in a related story, researchers have found that 3-tesla MRI does not seem to negatively affect hearing in infants born to mothers who were scanned, compared with the use of 1.5-tesla MRI.
New CardioServ
Finally, visit our Ultrasound Community for the latest from Judith Buckland of CardioServ on the proper methods for quantifying the right heart for both size and function. That article is available by clicking here, or go to ultrasound.auntminnie.com.
