Diagnostic Imaging Scan - November 27, 2007 - (Page 1) Business News For Medical Imaging “The Story Behind The Announcement” Business Briefs Week in previeW In a word, RSNA. CT will leave slice wars behind as vendor strategies diverge. The current 64-slice benchmark will fall to scanners offering 128 and 256 detector rows instead. But prospective customers will base future decisions on more than a (booth) number. • GE Healthcare (1729) demonstrates a new imaging chain to produce images with soft tissue contrast akin to that of MR. • Hitachi Medical Systems America (1144) prepares a 16slice scanner called Eclos CT for the U.S. market, after obtaining FDA clearance in August. • Philips Medical Systems (4129) features field-upgradeable scanners and its next-generation super-premium CT with a multifocal x-ray spot. • Siemens Medical Solutions (7713) leverages a decade of advances into the Definition AS. The CT offers wider coverage, faster rotation, and more power and takes spatial and temporal resolution to a new level, according to the firm. • Toshiba Medical Systems (7130) realizes flat-panel imaging with the power of 256 detector rows, achieving whole-organ coverage in a single rotation. MR vendors put new twists on their old ways. Clinical applications dominate, but new scanners built for patient and budgetary comfort dot the exhibit floor. • Esaote (3339) brings out SSCAN, a joint and spine scanner derived from the company’s G-Scan. S-SCAN includes improved electronics, new coils for lumbar and cervical spine, new pulse sequences, and a modified magnet. Unlike the G-SCAN, neither the magnet nor the patient table on S-SCAN can rotate from a horizontal to a vertical position. Siemens’ Definition AS redefines CT DI SCAN looks under the hood of Siemens’ latest development Siemens Medical Solutions unveils a new CT platform this week at the RSNA meeting that company executives claim will put an end to the slice wars vendors have been fighting since the first multislice scanners were commercialized eight years ago. “This is not just about a scanner with more detector rows,” said Peter Kingma, Siemens vice president for CT. “We truly want to distance ourselves from detector rows as a technological or clinical positioning tool.” The German company’s new Definition AS (Adaptive Scanning) is currently a work-inprogress but is slated to begin shipping in May 2008. It bears the class name of Siemens’ dual-beam scanner, unveiled two years ago, even though it uses only a single x-ray beam. It does, however, incorporate other advanced technologies found in the Definition platform. “This is a totally different system that has the DNA of the best-of-breed innovations we have brought out over the last 10 years,” Kingma told DI SCAN. “But it is an absolutely new platform.” The scanner is called adaptive to make a point about its versatility, which is already apparent on the assembly line. Definition AS can be configured with 20, 32, or 64 detector rows. Siemens’ z-Sharp technology doubles the slice number per rotation while its Stratton x-ray tube narrows the focal spot. Together, the technologies deliver spatial resolution of 0.24-mm pixels. The scanner provides unprecedented temporal resolution, according to Kingma. The gantry rotates every 300 msec, faster than the previous industry benchmark of 330 msec. A 30-mega heat unit x-ray tube offers continuous dynamic cooling, which allows the system to run at the highest power levels necessary to visualize any clinical target, he said. Adaptive 4D Spiral uses synchronized table movement to cover up to 27 cm by shuttling its 64 detector rows across a whole organ— such as the brain—to record blood perfusion. This shuttling is achieved as the table moves the patient back and forth inside the gantry, automatically and constantly varying the pitch. “The patient is almost unaware of the changes in direction,” Kingma said. A high-power generator, capable of producing up to 100 kW, delivers high-quality, dynamic images even on bariatric patients, who can now be supported by the CT’s new 650-pound-capacity table and 78-cm widebore gantry. “Combine the demands of bariatric and cardiac imaging in one examination and you can see that the added power is advantageous to the clinician,” he said. The faster gantry rotation as well as a new dose-reduction technique employing an intelligent collimator keep patient dose in check. Siemens engineers have blocked the amount of radiation the patient receives during the first and last 180º of rotation of the exam. These two half-rotations provide no diagnostically useful data, according to Kingma. Blocking them cuts radiation dose to the patient by 10% or more, he said. CAD developer targets false positives on RSNA floor Parascript seeks OEM partners in film and digital mammography RSNA newcomer Parascript takes aim this week at false positives in computer-aided detection, hoping to convince other vendors that its proprietary image analysis software, proven in fields outside radiology, can do a better job than other mammography CAD systems. In demonstrations on the exhibit floor, the company is targeting the biggest complaint of radiologists who use mammography CAD, as false positives waste time in an already time-precious environment. The more false positives, the more time wasted, as they go back to images to rule out suspicious lesions. This makes CAD one of the November 27, 2007 Copyright © 1991-2007 CMP Healthcare Media Group LLC
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