Cardiovascular Business - January/February 2008 - (Page 13)

Finally, PET/CT provides the potential to calculate blood flow and determine whether or not blood flow is diminished in a particular region of the heart. SPECT does not allow cardiologists to measure myocardial blood flow in specific regions. A Pet/Ct can provide additional diagnostic information and benefit patients with uniform reductions in blood flow. are there other patient populations that may benefit from Pet/Ct rather than sPeCt studies? Q A The use of PET to provide a measure of absolute blood flow will move from the research realm into routine clinical practice. Hybrid, high-resolution PET/CT images provide cardiologists additional information about perfusion and anatomy that we never had in the past. Another application that shows promise is the use of PET/CT to measure endothelial dysfunction to identify early coronary disease and determine patients at high-risk for a coronary event. Absolutely. SPECT tends to produce attenuation artifacts in certain patients, particularly obese patients and large-breasted women. PET/CT provides excellent attenuation correction, so it is well-suited to these patients. I believe that certain Cedars-Sinai patients will see an immediate benefit with the deployment of our PET/CT scanner: patients with an equivocal nuclear scan and initial studies for obese and large-breasted patients. Hospitals need to consider questions beyond the clinical advantages of technologies such as Pet/ Ct. in the current fiscal climate, any investments should be cost-justified. what are the economic, throughput or competitive advantages to adding cardiac Pet/Ct to a facility’s imaging portfolio? Hospitals have seen a significant portion of myocardial perfusion SPECT imaging migrate to private physician offices. PET/CT provides hospitals with an opportunity to recapture some of that business and differentiate themselves from private practices by offering a more sophisticated exam. In addition, there are throughput and volume advantages associated with cardiac PET/CT. It takes several hours to complete a myocardial perfusion SPECT study. A high-resolution cardiac PET/CT scan on our Biograph PET/CT, on the other hand, can easily be completed in 30 minutes, so sites can increase their volume while offering a more complete scan. Q A Q Cardiac Pet/Ct is in its infancy. How do you envision technology and applications evolving over the next few years? CardiovascularBusiness.com Cardiovascular Business 1 http://www.healthcomputing.com/Top_20 http://www.emageon.com http://www.emageon.com http://CardiovascularBusiness.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Cardiovascular Business - January/February 2008

Cardiovascular Business - January/February 2008 Contents The Ticker: Quality Pays in Several Ways Cover Story: The Proof: Why Evidence-based Medicine Improves Cardiac Care Clinical Study Digest: Co-payments and Cath Labs Cardiac PET/CT Fills in Gaps Left by SPECT Tapping into IT to Improve the Office-Based Practice SPECT–Proving Its Value Cardiac Images in the EMR: Just a Click Away The Top 20 Ways to Market Your Cardiac CTA Practice The Big Picture: Medical Displays for Cardiac Images Statins Work But Pharmacoeconomic Caveats Abound Driving Data Protection: Opting for Storage On- or Offsite News & Views Calendar Reader’s Resource

Cardiovascular Business - January/February 2008

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