Dear AuntMinnie Member,
A new breast imaging technique being developed promises higher resolution and lower radiation dose than existing technologies, according to U.S. and European researchers.
Called equally sloped tomography (EST), the technique produces 3D images of the breast that the researchers say are two to three times sharper than a CT scan. The technology acquires 512 images of the breast and then applies the algorithm -- with the entire process requiring less radiation than a mammogram.
While early experiments with the technology have been performed using a large synchrotron x-ray source, the authors believe that advances in x-ray technology could lead to the development of more compact sources that would be more practical to site at a hospital or imaging center. Learn more by clicking here.
In other news in our Women's Imaging Digital Community, a research team led by Dr. Constance Lehman compared the use of ultrasound and MRI to mammography in symptomatic women in their 30s -- historically a difficult population to image with mammography due to the prevalence of dense breast tissue.
The researchers found that ultrasound in particular performed well in these younger women, and it might be the modality of choice due to sensitivity far in advance of mammography and specificity that was only slightly lower. They suggest that mammography might be reserved for high-risk cases in women younger than 40. Learn more by clicking here, or visit the community at women.auntminnie.com.
Finally, visit our Molecular Imaging Digital Community for a study with intriguing implications. Researchers from Dartmouth Medical School analyzed Medicare spending on PET scans across the U.S. and found that black patients had lower rates of PET utilization than whites. Learn more by clicking here, or visit the community at molecular.auntminnie.com.
