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New Super Scanner Can Scan Body in Under a Minute
Smivs writes to mention that a new 3D scanner, unveiled at the Radiological Society of North America, has been in use for the last month at the Metro Health medical center in Cleveland, Ohio. This new scanner allows for much more detailed scans of the entire body in just under one minute also cutting the exposure to x-rays by as much as 80%. The cost of the new tech has not yet been released.
They now use Gamma rays......
I am the unwilling control for my Origin.
A CT scan (cat scan) is basically an X-ray machine that can yield 3D images just like an MRI. But CT is better at imaging bone and doing angiography. MRI's excel at soft tissue and make "movies" of things like a beating heart. MRI's are basically programmable and can do all kinds of things as a result.
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Go canucks, habs, and sens!
If I wasn't at work right now, I'd so be googling "bodyscan porn" right now so I could be...googling bodyscan porn. Well, that takes care of my plans for the night.
Sure I'm paranoid, but am I paranoid enough?
It's not a replacement for a CT scanner, it *IS* a CT scanner. The synopsis, as well as the article itself, is very vague and misleading. This isn't some brand new technology, it's technology that is and has been continually advancing since the 70's. I work with a 16 slice scanner in a hospital and it can do all of the 3d reconstructions like in this article, just takes longer to acquire the data from the patient.
To vacillate or not to vacillate, that is the question... or is it?
It's a CT scanner.
In other words, the technology is X-ray, but it electronically combines many images from many angles to build up a 3D image of what's inside the patient.
By the way, CT scans and MRIs are somewhat complementary to each other. Which one is "better" depends on what you are looking for:
CT uses X-rays, which I beleive (to my limited understanding) essentially measure density. Denser matter stops more X-rays, less dense matter lets more through.
MRI on the other hand uses magnetic resonance, which senses water concentration by alligning the magnetic dipole moments of water neuclei, and then "pinging" them and watching them resonate. Water concentration in the wrong place can indicate ruptured cell walls found in tumors, for example. Depending on exactly what you're hoping to spot, one may be better technology than the other.
(Disclaimer, I am not a doctor. Just someone with too many friends and relatives with cancer, unfortunately).