In October 2004 Toshiba introduced Xario, its new, premium high-end ultrasound scanner to the market and exhibited the system at major congresses throughout Europe. The following article gives an overview of its features and functions and provides an insight into the latest technological developments for meeting the rapidly changing demands of today's challenging clinical practice.
On Wednesday, 24 March of this year, I arrived in Warsaw, Poland, where my Polish colleague, Mr Sikora, picked me up and we continued our bumpy road to Katowice by car. The roads were bad and the weather was worse: snow, snow and more snow. But finally we made it to Gornoslaskie Centrum Medyczne in Katowice, where the first Asteion Super 4 had been installed in a European hospital. It is the…
Arteriosclerosis is well known as a vascular disease and cardiovascular risk factor. In its generalised form it affects not only the peripheral vessels (pelvis, legs) but also the coronary vessels and the carotid arteries. Arteriosclerosis is primarily a manifestation of advancing age, hence it is often accompanied by other diseases of the lungs and the heart as well as by metabolic diseases…
Increasingly more importance is being ascribed to early detection of colon carcinoma and of its precursor stages, since there has been a practically twofold increase in the incidence of this disease in Germany over the past 20 years. With a combination of 1. case history, 2. rectal palpation result, 3.'blood in stools' test (haemoccult) and 4. coloscopy, many conspicuous changes to the intestinal…
The exposure of patients to radiation by computed tomography has been widely discussed in recent years, both by professionals and by the public. The essential reason for optimizing patient exposure is the basic desire to keep radiation dose at the lowest possible level. This requires above all organ-specific and patient-specific adjustment of the radiation exposure in order to achieve uniform…
The Aquilion 64 builds on previous CT technology with its unique 64-slice detector, isotropic scanning and VolumeView volume reconstruction technology to offer greater diagnostic capabilities enabling patients to avoid invasive medical procedures. The Aquilion 64 demonstrates Toshiba's in-depth industry knowledge and desire to deliver leading-edge CT technology and applications to the medical…
It sounds quite far fetched to connect ultrasound examinations to dolphins or does it? In Europe there are about 300 dolphins under human care and with most of these animals ultrasound examinations are quite common.
Increased incidence of vascular diseases and improved medical-imaging technologies expand the application base for contrast media. According to a new study from US market-research group Frost & Sullivan, sales of medical-imaging contrast media will see an impressive 58 per cent rise until 2013.
Three-dimensional transrectal ultrasonography (3D-TRUS) allows accurate 3D examination of pathological structures and prediction of extracapsular tumor extension.
The next-generation of hybrid imaging technology was presented at this years SNM meeting in Washington, D.C: The first human brain images from a prototype PET/MRI system, which is developed by a collaborative team of German and US researchers from the Universities of Tübingen and Tennessee, as well as Siemens Medical Solutions.
Due to echogenicity differences in comparison with the surrounding liver tissue conventional B-mode-imaging sonography permits the unambiguous classification of the frequently occurring typical liver cysts (criteria: round, echo-free, smoothly demarcated, with edge shadows and sound through transmission) and calcifications (highly reflective, acoustic shadows). The detection and characterization…
Sonography is an increasingly used examination procedure for the diagnosis of illnesses of the hand, especially of the soft tissues. Sonoanatomic assessment of the functional structures (Tab. 1) sometimes allows the exclusion of various differential diagnoses. However, this requires quite a bit of experience on the part of the examiner. The assessment of the peripheral nerves can be difficult -…
With an innovative technique called multiplexing, the data collection speed of CT scanners may increase by hundreds of times with the result of better and faster imaging and potentially lower x-ray exposures.
Imaging of blood flow with colour Doppler sonography is an established method in prenatal medicine. Today, there are several techniques which offer colour visualisation whose quality is on a par with that of the B-mode. One example of such a technique is Advanced Dynamic Flow (ADF). Looking at two cases, we will describe the clinical use of ADF to visualise fetal vascular tumours. The quality of…
The following two articles look at the advantages of a new ultrasound technique in prenatal diagnostics: Advanced Dynamic Flow (ADF). While the authors use ADF for different purposes - K. S. Heling applies ADF for general vascular imaging and R. Schmitz focuses on fetal liver tumours and a fetal aneurysm in the vein of Galen - they both arrive at remarkably similar conclusions. But read for…
Located in the southeastern part of Brussels, the “Cliniques de l'Europe” is a group of three clinics: Saint Elisabeth, Deux Alices and St. Michel. Over a period of several years, our organization has been restructured and adapted to the needs of this facility which serves a local population of approximately 250,000. Cliniques de l'Europe has at its disposal a complete range of dedicated…
In 1998, the radiology department of the Kopernik hospital had to be modernized. The owner of the hospital, the province of Lodz, couldn't afford such an investment and as a public institution the hospital itself couldn't take up a loan. Dr. Tazbir came up with the idea to found a limited liability company in order to be able to raise the money.
Spiral computed tomography first allowed the seamless acquisition of entire volumina without first separating them into individual slices. With the newest generation of MSCT devices having the 16-slice technology, short gantry rotation time of < 0.5 seconds, and a high performance processor, it is now possible to acquire large amounts of data in a short period of time with high spatial and…
Modern imaging modalities are increasingly playing a role in planning therapy for aortic diseases and in follow-up exams after surgery or endovascular intervention. The methods employed for minimally invasive endovascular therapy have been continually improved in recent years and are now being used by vascular surgeons or radiologists to treat thoracic, thoracoabdominal and abdominal aortic…
Modern oncology with its improved options holds out prospects for many novel curative and palliative procedures. By adopting a multidisciplinary approach to diagnosis, treatment and follow-up care these prospects can become reality, with radiology playing a pivotal role. This role encompasses imaging diagnostics for all tumour entities as well as diagnostic and therapeutic interventions.…
Australia - The Australian Institute of Health and Welfare has reported a 26% decrease in the breast cancer mortality rate among women aged 50-69 years between 1990 and 2004.
In the Caucasian population, subarachnoid hemorrhage (SAH) due to a ruptured intracranial aneurysm is seen with an incidence of 6 to 8 per 100,000. In some specific countries such as Finland and Japan these numbers rise to 20 per 100,000. 60% of patients presenting with an aneurysmal SAH are female. The presenting symptoms are: thunderclap headache in combination with (temporary) loss of…
Toshiba introduces its new 1.5 MR system in Europe VISIONS: After a period of relative silence Toshiba' MRbusiness division is about to introduce a new system. What is the reason for this increased attention? Hans Baartman: In 2003 a new MRI product, the EXCELART Vantage, was introduced in Japan and the USA where it has become very successful. Because the MRI community is very internationally…
For the last six months we have been using the Aplio system in sonography for children and adolescents. The following report describes our experiences with this system using a wide range of probe and special applications.
Echo-enhanced ultrasound is a newly available imaging modality for use in the differential diagnosis of pancreatic tumours. Ductal carcinomas are often hypovascularised compared with the surrounding tissue. On the other hand, neuroendocrine tumours ar hypervascularised lesions. Tumours associated with pancreatitis have a different vascularisation pattern depending upon their inflammation and…
