This week's experience was much similar to last week's, which was basically following Dr. Prince going through various cases. However, with the help of previous experience, I got more clues about how to read specific images (CT or MR), and learned something interesting and useful from specific case:
In one case, the patient was given a knee replacement made by metal and plastic, and then returned to hospital due to severe swelling around the implant. The swelling area was mostly filled with blood, and preliminary diagnosis was made as over-vascularity. In order to remove the over-growing blood vessels, physicians needed to know where exactly they resided. Dr. Prince introduced a imaging technique called X-ray Angiogram, in which the doctor injects iodine contrast into the artery at the root of thigh (where the artery is close to the skin), and takes knee X-ray images at the rate of 10 per sec. Since the contrast in blood vessels turns opaque on X-ray, subsequent images are subtracted for better vascular visualization. With this technique the doctor could easily discern the location of the over-grown vascularity, and inject the solution to destroy it.
On Thursday, we were given a refreshing lecture by Dr. Prince on Medical Imaging. We went through different cases in which CT, X-ray and MR images are used for diagnosis of various disease and traumas. The most impressive to me was that Dr. Prince guided us analyze the characteristic of each image, trying to pinpoint and collect detailed information provided in the image and to process them in a reasonable and scientific way. With the help of thorough understanding of anatomy and biochemistry, it was both interesting and amazing how minor structures could reveal significant symptom and manifestation of specific disorder or disease.
No comments:
Post a Comment