Anti-seizure medication is not successful in all patients, while in others such medication can have side effects. In recent years significant technical advances have delivered better imaging results, which, combined with growing demand for a surgical solution from patients whose medications do not control seizures, or those not wanting to take medication constantly, has led to an increase in…
Whole-body hybrid PET-MR scanners are emerging on the market and are expected to have a significant impact in diagnostic imaging particularly in oncology applications and also in other clinical domains, such as cardiology, inflammatory and infectious disease, as well as in neurological applications.
Royal Philips Electronics is announcing CE marking for the industry’s first commercially available whole body PET/MR imaging system, the Ingenuity TF PET/MR*. This new system, being launched as the first new Philips modality in ten years, integrates the molecular imaging capabilities of PET with the superior soft tissue contrast of MR to image disease cells as they proliferate in soft tissue.…
Even more precise diagnoses, even better process controls -- the future of MR-PET technology has dawned. The first commercial, full-body hybrid scanners are either waiting in the wings or already installed. But what does the introduction of the MR-PET really mean for clinical practice? Professor Heinz-Peter Schlemmer MD, Head of the Radiology Department at the German Cancer Research Centre in…
Something that often obstructs a pioneering medical spirit is simply a practicality: the lack of space. For many hospitals, investment in new medical equipment is linked with construction and reshaping the hospital’s architecture – sometimes impossible because of the infrastructure. This was precisely the situation at the University Hospital Geneva (Hôpitaux Universitaires de Genève = HUG)…
2010 workshop in Aachen, Germany, in March, were welcomed by Professor Thomas M Deserno, head of the Medical Informatics Department at RWTH Aachen University and organiser of what turned out to be an ‘outstanding’ scientific programme.
Since June 2009, the focus of research in the European Network for Cell Imaging and Tracking Expertise (ENCITE) has been on finding biomarkers to aid cell transplantation. Funded with €11 million from the European Commission (EC), this major project that runs until 2013, involves 10 countries. Their work is coordinated by the European Institute for Biomedical Imaging Research (EIBIR) network,…
The technological integration of positron emission tomography (PET) and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) has been the dream of molecular imaging experts and engineers for some time. Now, the German Science Council has agreed to provide 6.56 million funding to install a whole-body MRI-PET prototype in the centre of excellence for imaging procedures at the radiology clinic in Eberhard-Karls…
Integrated PET/MRI systems will permit the simultaneous acquisition of molecular, functional and structural parameters. The combined strengths of PET (high sensitivity and specificity, but relatively low spatial resolution) and MRI (high resolution, but low sensitivity) is the most attractive feature of multimodal imaging with hybrid scanners. Their application could substantially contribute to…
For many indications, because PET-CT produces a very high accuracy for many tumours, this modality is the gold standard, Prof. Reiser confirmed. It also enables good observation of the course of the disease. After an injection of radioactive tracers we can visualise increased metabolic activity in great detail and with high sensitivity. This is an increasingly important issue not only in primary…
The so-called 11-labeled Pittsburgh Compound B ([11C]PiB) type of positron emission tomography (PET) may be useful in a non-invasive assessment of the formation of Alzheimer's disease-related plaques, according to a study that will appear in the October 2008 issue of Archives of Neurology.
For individualised radiotherapy, high-precision delineation and characterisation of the tumour is critical. If highest radiation doses are delivered in a targeted fashion, the chance of tumour cell kill increases and tumour control probability is enhanced.