Imaging & Diagnostics

Subscribe to this RSS Feed

According to a recent report from ABI Research, a market intelligence company specializing in global technology markets, while the market for disposable wireless Medical Body Area Network (MBAN) sensors within professional healthcare is in its earliest stages, the foundations to support adoption are now in place. They also report that there is a tremendous potential for adoption. So much so that by 2018, they predict that nearly 5 million disposable sensors will be shipped even though the sensors will have still barely penetrated the addressable market.

Read More >>

When it comes to outsourcing many complex professional services, this type of work should not be viewed as a mere commodity, say researchers at Harvard Business School, reporting in the journal, Organization Science. Instead, they say, cultivating important person-to-person relationships with the vendor of outsourced services can improve efficiency and even the quality of services delivered, especially in health care, where outsourcing is on the rise.

Read More >>

A handheld diagnostic device that researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, first developed to diagnose cancer has been adapted to rapidly diagnose tuberculosis (TB) and other important infectious bacteria. The portable device combines microfluidic technology with nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) to not only diagnose these important infections but also determine the presence of antibiotic-resistant bacterial strains.
Read More >>

The Moffitt Cancer Center and the University of South Florida, both in Tampa, have collaborated with researchers in China, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, and Germany to develop a new computational method to assess lung cancer tumors using CT, PET, or MRI diagnostic technologies. The method, called single click ensemble segmentation (SCES), uses a new computer algorithm they developed to help segment and extract features of a tumor. This new approach not only improves diagnosis and prognosis assessments, but also saves time and health care dollars.
Read More >>

Scientists at Princeton University in New Jersey used silk strands and tiny gold wires bundled with graphene to create a removable tattoo that adheres to dental enamel and could eventually be used to monitor a patient’s health with unprecedented sensitivity.

Read More >>

Single fiber endoscope increases resolution fourfold over previous similar devices.

Engineers at Stanford University have developed and demonstrated a prototype single-fiber endoscope that, they say, quadruples the resolution over existing designs, which might lead to the development of needle-thin, minimally invasive endoscopes able to view features out of reach of today’s instruments.
Read More >>

Electrocardiogram (ECG or EKG) measurements typically involve time-consuming skin preparation, lead application, conductive gels, and even shaving of body hair. More recently, dry contact sensors have come into use in some sports and home health monitoring units, but these frequently experience contact problems, particularly in users with dry skin.
Read More >>

Ultrasound technology could soon be improved to produce high-quality, highresolution images, thanks to the development of a new key material by a team of researchers in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Texas A&M University, College Station.
Read More >>

NASA Technology

You wouldn’t find a big bowl of spaghetti served on the International Space Station (ISS). In microgravity, it would be a complete mess. There is, however, something like spaghetti on the ISS: the wires that connect electrodes for an electrocardiogram (EKG). They can be just as much of a nuisance for the crew members.
Read More >>

Introduction A well-known legend has it that one of the greatest scientists and inventors of antiquity, Archimedes of Syracuse, stepped into a bath only to eject and propel himself naked throughout the city, yelling “Eureka!”, Greek for “I have found (it),” thus celebrating his discovery of how to measure the volume of irregular objects. Whether this indeed happened or not remains an open question, but a few important lessons can certainly be learned from this story. The first lesson is that good ideas could occur to us while we are taking a bath or a shower. The second lesson is that scientific or technological problems often seem to be difficult before a brilliantly simple solution is found. Does this second lesson hold true today? This is the question we will try to answer using an example of our own journey into discovery.
Read More >>

Using hundreds of untethered grippers, each as small as a dust mote, engineers and physicians at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, say they have devised a method to perform biopsies that could provide a more effective way to access narrow conduits in the body as well as find early signs of cancer or other diseases.
Read More >>

Experience is the greatest teacher, but being able to have actual experience with a patient’s individual anatomy prior to surgery has been out of reach of surgeons until now. Currently, there are various software systems that use 3D animation, interaction, and virtual participation to rehearse surgery electronically. But, researchers at the University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, say that they are pioneering a new technique that uses CT scanners and 3D printers to allow surgeons to train on physical copies of unique patient anatomies in preparation for operations.

Read More >>

A technology being developed at the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN, promises to provide clear images of the brains of children, the elderly, and people with Parkinson's and other diseases without the use of uncomfortable or intrusive restraints. This new type of awake imaging provides motion compensation reconstruction, which removes blur caused by motion, allowing physicians to get a transparent picture of the functioning brain without anesthetics that can mask conditions and alter test results. The use of anesthetics, patient restraints or both is not ideal because they can trigger brain activities that may alter the normal brain functions being studied.

Read More >>

RTI International, Research Triangle Park, NC, one of the world’s leading research institutes, has developed a prototype catheter that can generate live, streaming 3D ultrasound images from inside the heart. The device received a Cardiovascular Innovation Award at the 2013 Cardiovascular Research Technologies Annual Symposium. The technology, called a live volumetric imaging (LVI) intracardiac catheter, has the potential to improve catheter-based interventional heart procedures such as transcatheter valve therapies and cardiac ablation for arrhythmias.

Read More >>

A new method of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) could allow early identification of specific cancers, multiple sclerosis, heart disease, and other maladies, say researchers at Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, OH, and University Hospitals (UH) Case Medical Center. They explain that every body tissue and disease has a unique fingerprint that can be used to diagnose problems before they become untreatable. By using new MRI technologies, known as magnetic resonance fingerprinting (MRF), to scan simultaneously for various physical properties, the team say that they could differentiate white matter from gray matter from cerebrospinal fluid in the brain in about 12 seconds. And, they believe that the technology could achieve the same results even faster in the near future.
Read More >>

As cardiovascular disease has increased globally in recent decades, clinical demand for transesophageal echocardiography (TEE) has risen along with it. In TEE, a clinician inserts an ultrasound probe by mouth and guides it through the esophagus to capture images of the functioning heart. The procedure is commonly used by cardiac anesthesiologists to monitor patients undergoing surgery and in intensive care—as well as by imaging specialists to diagnose valvular heart disease.
Read More >>

Ultrasound technology could soon be improved to produce high-quality, high-resolution images, thanks to the development of a new key material by a team of researchers in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Texas A&M University, College Station. The engineered material, known as a "metamaterial," offers significant advantages over conventional ultrasound technology, which generates images by converting ultrasound waves into electrical signals. But ultrasound is still largely constrained by bandwidth and sensitivity limitations, which have been an obstacle in producing high-quality images as diagnostic tools.

Read More >>

A bedside electronic device that measures eye movements can be used to quickly determine whether the cause of severe, continuous, disabling dizziness is a stroke or something benign, according to researchers at Johns Hopkins Medicine, Baltimore, MD. To distinguish stroke from a more benign condition, such as vertigo linked to an inner ear disturbance, specialists typically use three eye movement tests that are essentially a stress test for the balance system. In the hands of specialists, these clinical tests have been shown in several large research studies to be extremely accurate but require expertise to determine if a patient is making the fast corrective eye adjustments needed.

Read More >>

Imperial College London, London, UK
http://www3.imperial.ac.uk

A new system to allow specialists to image difficult areas of the body, which could potentially improve the way procedures such as knee replacement surgery are carried out, is being developed by researchers at Imperial College London.
Read More >>

An estimated one and half million individuals seek medical treatment for head trauma in the US each year, and annually about 10 million individuals seek treatment for head trauma worldwide. Intracranial hematomas resulting from a traumatic brain injury are a life-threatening, but treatable cause of secondary brain injury in patients who have sustained head trauma. But, successful treatment often relies upon timely diagnosis and intervention prior to the occurrence of brain damage. A computed tomography (CT) scan is the current clinical standard examination to detect this condition.
Read More >>

Online tool allows user to conveniently capture and manage images from medical devices.

A new image capture software development kit (SDK), called the Dynamic Web TWAIN, allows the simplified creation of an online tool to manage images of patient records. It enables image application providers to deliver a method to capture images from medical devices, such as intraoral cameras and digital x-ray equipment, and then send the medical images to a central web server. Such medical image captures can be sent alongside a patient’s identification, results data, applied treatments, next visit schedules, and more. An SDK allows implementation within popular Internet browsers, including Internet Explorer, Chrome, Firefox, Safari, or Opera. (See Figure 1)
Read More >>

Doctors regularly check patients’ hand-eye coordination to monitor any neuromuscular deficits, particularly as they age or when they are injured, but the tests may be subjective and qualitative. To more clearly assess changes, researchers at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and Hebrew SeniorLife, Boston, recently completed the first clinical study of a new rapid neuro assessment device they developed to quantitatively measure neuromuscular performance.

Read More >>

Engineers at Purdue University, W. Lafayette, IN, are using a system of models to extract specific information from huge collections of data and then reconstructing images in order to improve the performance of technologies ranging from medical CT scanners to digital cameras. Their new approach is called model-based iterative reconstruction (MBIR). MBIR has been used in a new CT scanning technology that exposes patients to one-fourth the radiation of conventional CT scanners, due to increased efficiency achieved via the models and algorithms. MBIR reduces "noise" in the data, providing greater clarity that allows the radiologist or radiological technician to scan the patient at a lower dosage.
Read More >>

Neurological imaging experts at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD, have figured out how owls, which can rotate their heads by as much as 270 degrees in either direction, do so without cutting off blood supply to their brains and without damaging the delicate blood vessels in their necks and large, heavy heads. This could also help to explain why humans are prone to neck injuries. By using angiography, CT scans, and medical illustrations to examine the anatomy of a dozen owls, the Hopkins team, in collaboration with a medical illustrator in the Department of Art, found four major biological adaptations designed to prevent injury from rotational head movements. The variations all apply to the bone structure and vascular network needed to support its head. 


Read More >>

According to Jonathan Linkous, CEO of The American Telemedicine Association (ATA), Washington, DC, after 40-plus years of development, telemedicine is finally becoming mainstream in transforming the delivery of care. He said that more than five million Americans had their medical images read remotely last year, approximately 10% of all the intensive care unit beds in the US use telemedicine; and one million Americans benefit from remote cardiac monitoring for implantable devices or for checking on a suspected cardiac arrhythmia. There are now more than 13,000 consumer health applications for the iPhone alone.
Read More >>