CT scan

Emphysema on CT Significantly Correlated With Mortality

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Click through for the abstract.  There is a link on the page for a PDF version.

CT Scan Findings of Emphysema Predict Mortality in COPD — CHEST

Results: Of the 251 patients, 79 died, with 40 classified as respiratory deaths not involving lung cancer. Univariate Cox analysis revealed that emphysematous change as assessed by CT scan, lung function, age, or BMI were significantly correlated with mortality. Multivariate analysis revealed that emphysematous change as assessed by CT scan had the best association with mortality.

Conclusions: Emphysematous change as assessed by CT scan predicts respiratory mortality in outpatients with various stages of COPD.

Oops! Missed Another One

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Medical News: Abdominal Aortic Aneurysms Often Missed on CT Scans – in Radiology, Diagnostic Radiology from MedPage Today

Moreover, 9% of aneurysms unidentified were 5.5 cm or larger, and clinical teams didn’t recognize 58% of dilations within three months of the scan.

Oops.

Lung Screening Study – CT For Cancer Has Up To 33% False Positives

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Medical News: ASCO: False Positives Common in Lung Cancer CT Screening – in Meeting Coverage, ASCO from MedPage Today

A positive screen was defined as any noncalcified nodule at least four millimeters in size or other radiographic finding deemed suspicious for cancer.

A false positive was defined as a positive screen with either a completed negative work-up or at least 12 months follow-up with no cancer diagnosis, the researchers said.

Analysis showed:

* An individual’s cumulative probability of at least one false-positive CT scan was 21% after one screen and 33% after two.
* For chest X-rays, the cumulative probabilities were 9% and 15% after one and two screens, respectively.
* In a multivariate analysis, people over 64 years of age had a 34% increased risk of a false-positive CT scan.
* Of those getting a CT false positive, 6.6% had an invasive diagnostic procedure and 1.6% had major surgery, compared with 4.2% and 1.9%, respectively, for chest X-ray false positives.

There are no screening methods for lung cancer that have been shown to reduce death and illness from the disease, which is often only detected in its late stages.

According to the American Cancer Society, the five-year survival rate for localized lung cancer is 49.5%, but that falls to 20.6% for disease that has spread outside the lung and 2.8% if there are distant metastases.