Extravasation of contrast in CT

It happens occassionally, despite all precautions. Here, the extravasation was about 10 cm proximal to the injection site in the antecubital fossa, which we had not come across before. An x-ray confirmed that it was contrast.

This is not an advert for Dell

Since my previous post on using consumer-grade monitors for diagnosis there have been more reports on this subject, all suggesting that an appropriate consumer-grade colour monitor might perform just as well as medical-grade grey scale monitors costing 10 times more.

Read them here, here and here.

I've spoken to some vendors about this and mentioned it in the RCR PACS group forum, and the objections to these monitors have been to do with quality control and longevity.

We'll see what happens in future.

The monitor in question is the 24" Dell 2405 , which has now been superseded by the 2407. It has comparable brightness and contrast to medical grade monitors (not the case with other consumer-grade products), is currently on the "A-list". of PC Pro. Here's the review.

I've never even seen one of these Dells so this post is not a personal endorsement or recommendation.

Radiology Search Engines added

Yottalook (beta) is a Radiology Search engine for images or references that is based on Google .
Goldminer is a radiological image search engine hosted by the American Roentgen Ray Society, and results are limited to "images from respected peer-reviewed images".

Here's more about them from Pacsweb.

Yottalook and Goldminer have been added to the 'Links' section of this site, on the right hand sidebar.

New addition: MRI lumbar spine nomenclature

I have posted a summary of the American Society of Neuroradiology nomenclature for lumbar disc pathology, and an MR-based grading system for lumbar root compromise due to disk herniation (Pfirrmann 2004) in the "Protocols and Guidelines" section.

You can go to the page directly from here.

Cancer staging manual added to this site

I've added a Cancer Staging Manual with a link to the RCR guidelines and, for a start, pages for lung, renal and prostate cancer, with details of TNM staging and other things I've found useful. These are things I've found difficult to remember, and I've posted them here to save myself the trouble of hunting around for books etc.
You can get to the manual from the 'Protocols and Guidelines' page, or by clicking here.

MRI safety questionnaire added to Protocols and Guidelines Section

For the benefit of our patients, and the convenience of our esteemed customers, the MRI saftey questionnaire can now be downloaded from the "guidelines and protocols" section of this site.
To go straight to the page, click here .

Build your own PACS using free open-source software

From Antoine Rosset, developer of Osirix.
This is based on Apple Mac components but the all software is open source, and can be downloaded from the internet.

Full step-by -step instructions here.

You can work out the cost of the hardware (in the UK) by visiting the Apple Store.

From today's CT list

Small bowel obstruction due to left inguinal hernia

Sonosite portable ultrasound machines on eBay

I look on eBay for medical equipment from time to time, out of idle curiosty. SonoSite portable ultrasound machines are frequently on sale, and there were more than ususal today: one SonoSite 180 plus, one SonoSite 180, one MicroMaxx, one Titan, one Sonoheart, as well as a linear SonoSite probe.


Our old SonoSite 180 could do with replacement, and that linear probe would come in handy. If I recall correctly, our SonoSite originally cost £18 000 with one probe only.