Dear AuntMinnie Member,
Point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) is an amazing technology -- putting the power of medical imaging literally into your pocket. POCUS is so portable that it's making it possible to perform imaging exams in locations that were previously unthinkable, including the roof of the world, Mount Everest.
Swiss researchers used POCUS to help diagnose a case of altitude sickness that occurred during a medical research expedition on the world's highest mountain. They were able to use the scanner to detect clinical signs of altitude sickness such as cerebral edema. The climber was evacuated by helicopter and soon recovered.
Our coverage of the episode was our top story on AuntMinnie.com for the past week -- get articles like this and more in our Ultrasound Community.
8-ring SPECT CZT
Over the last several decades, major advances have been made in the development of digital detector technology for SPECT. But a team led by researchers from the University of California, San Francisco hope to take digital SPECT to the next level with their plans for a new type of gamma camera using eight cadmium zinc telluride (CZT) digital detectors.
The system is still in the early stages, but the group recently presented its ideas in a paper we covered in our Molecular Imaging Community. The authors hope the eight-detector CZT design could cut scan times by up to one-third.
In other news, the ketogenic diet has become a popular option for losing weight, but it's possible that the high-protein diet could have clinical advantages as well. Researchers from the University of Minnesota found that patients who followed a keto diet before PET/CT scans had lower levels of background myocardial activity, which led to better image quality.
Finally, it's become well known that the COVID-19 vaccine could cause changes on mammography exams that mimic pathology. But the phenomenon also appears to be visible on PET/CT studies.
Visit our Molecular Imaging Community for more coverage of nuclear medicine and molecular imaging.
Fetal cardiac MRI
Fetal cardiovascular MRI scans can give clinicians useful information about congenital heart defects when echocardiography exams are inconclusive, according to an article in our MRI Community.
In other MRI news, the modality can help in the early detection of periodontitis, a recent study found, while other research offers insights into the impact of anesthesia on cognitive function in patients who receive it. And be sure to check out some amazing images from a new study proposing that cardiac MRI could be used to screen for heart disease.
You'll find these articles and more in our MRI Community.
