GE's new volume CT scanner reduces radiation exposure by 70%
4 December 2006 GE Healthcare's LightSpeed VCT XT computed tomography
(CT) scanner maintains outstanding image quality while reducing a patient’s
radiation exposure by up to 70% for diagnostic cardiac scans. It includes
hardware and enhanced applications that allows users to add the clinical
value of volume CT by providing new capabilities for imaging the heart,
head, and other body parts. “As leaders in CT, GE continues to focus on
developing technologies that provide clinical excellence and outstanding
image quality while reducing dose exposure for patients,” said Gene
Saragnese, vice president and general manager of GE Healthcare’s CT and
Molecular Imaging business. “The LightSpeed VCT XT provides clarity,
additional information and helps to generate confident physician diagnoses
while reducing radiation exposure in diagnostic cardiac scans.”
Radiologists who have used the LightSpeed VCT XT advanced applications have
found that these technical and clinical innovations have transformed how and
when they use CT. Synchronizing the heart rate In standard
cardiac CT exams, the X-ray is on for the duration of a scan, even during
periods when a patient’s heart is at an undesirable phase. With the SnapShot
Pulse system, an automated response to a patient’s heart rate ensures that
the X-ray is only on for portions of a scan. This process, called
prospective triggered gating, significantly reduces a patient’s X-ray
exposure time. “I’ve been doing Cardiac CT for four years, and this is the
most exciting development that I’ve used, having the ability to
significantly reduce radiation dose,” said Dr. James Earls of Fairfax
Radiological Consultants, Fairfax, Va. “The patient benefit is huge — to be
able to reduce the dose by up to 70% in some cases really changes the
paradigm on how radiologists will approach patients who are presenting with
different degrees of risk factors.” Not missing a beat The
LightSpeed VCT XT is the first multi-slice scanner capable of performing CT
angiographic (CTA) studies where the table moves from one location to the
next to cover the entire volume of the patient’s heart, a mode of scanning
called step-and-shoot. The LightSpeed VCT XT tracks a patient’s heart rate
real-time so the X-ray and acquisition time is driven by each individual
patient, enabling clinicians to obtain high quality images with a very low
dose exposure. “Based on over 100 patients scanned with our new system, we
were able to obtain high image quality for a wide range of patient sizes
while the average radiation dose was about 5 mSv with a range of 1 to 9
mSv,” said Dr. Jean-Louis Sablayrolles, Head of CT Cardiac Imaging Radiology
at the Centre Cardiologique de Nord (CCN) in Saint-Denis, France.
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