A shift from analog to digital equipment will push the overall Chinese X-ray market to the $1.32 billion mark by 2016, predicts the medical research company InMedica.

It says multinational suppliers, not Chinese companies, will reap most of that bonanza.

In a news release promoting a new report about the Chinese market, InMedica says shipments of analog X-ray equipment to China will … read more »

MRI can detect signs of potential developmental dyslexia in children even before they begin learning to read, according to researchers at Children’s Hospital Boston.

That could be very useful because the earlier the intervention, the better the prognosis in treating developmental dyslexia.

Senior investigator Nadine Gaab, PhD, of the hospital’s Labs of Cognitive Neuroscience said dyslexia usually isn’t diagnosed until the child … read more »

Mayo Clinic is building two new proton beam treatment facilities, one in Minnesota and one in Arizona. They exemplify either “what is wrong with American health care today” or an “investment to ensure that [Mayo's] patients have access to proven, effective, safe treatment for serious illnesses.”

Or maybe both. Or neither.

The “what’s wrong” assessment comes from Ezekiel J. Emanuel, MD, PhD, … read more »

Low doses of ionizing radiation may not carry as much cancer risk as we’ve thought, according to researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, California.

Breast-cancer researcher Mina Bissell, PhD, explained:
Our data show that at lower doses of ionizing radiation, DNA repair mechanisms work better than at higher doses. This nonlinear DNA damage response casts … read more »

The delicacy of some crystalline molecules has led to a new X-ray technique that may eventually reduce radiation doses for human patients.

B.C. Wang, PhD, studies molecules. (He’s Ramsey-Georgia Research Alliance Eminent Scholar in Structural Biology at the University of Georgia in Athens). X-ray crystallography—bombarding molecules’ crystalline forms with X-rays—reveals the position of chemical bonds and other important properties.

However, large molecules, … read more »

A young woman who ended up paralyzed after two University of California, Davis radiologists missed an arteriovenous malformation in an MRI scan won a $7.6 million malpractice verdict on Friday.

The defense conceded that the abnormal mass was visible on the scan but said that it was “subtle” and therefore that missing it fell within the appropriate standard of care. The … read more »

The official process for measuring microwave radiation from mobile phones greatly underestimates the actual exposure, especially for children, according to a study published online Friday in Electromagnetic Biology and Medicine.

The study says that when a child uses a cell phone, the radiation absorption in the child’s head may be twice as high as an adult’s, and absorption in the skull’s … read more »

Earlier this week, Diagnostic Imaging explored several ways in which MRI machines are becoming more patient-friendly. This comes on the heels, however, of a PLoS ONE research article that indicates they still have a way to go.

Diagnostic Imaging cited three specific improvements:

Extremity scanners, which scan ankles, wrists, and other parts of extremities more efficiently (and more cheaply) than running a … read more »

A radiologist who until recently worked at University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics in Iowa City has accused the head of the school’s radiology department of making racist and derogatory remarks about foreign-born physicians in the department.

The claims are made in an affidavit associated with a lawsuit against the university by a radiologist fighting the school’s attempt to discipline and … read more »

Monster tornadoes slashed across northern Alabama on April 27, leaving a horror-movie scene of obliterated buildings and broken bodies — including broken young bodies.

The storms struck in the early evening, shredding some of Birmingham’s northern suburbs. (To get an idea of their malevolence — there’s no other word that fits — click here.) Minutes later, patients began flooding into Children’s … read more »