"You can never be better than your gold standard," George said. "No matter what you compare anything to, it's always going to be below it. But those accuracies are as good or better than any test that has been compared to a gold standard. So they're very good."

And while perhaps not as accurate as SPECT scans and angiograms, the CT scans were more efficient. The two scans took about half an hour, compared with the two hours it takes for patients to absorb an injected chemical tracer for SPECT scans. Plus, patients only needed one appointment for diagnostic information ordinarily provided by the two separate tests.


The CT scans also involved less radiation, around 11.5 mSv for the two CT scans, versus an average of 13 mSv for the SPECT scans. They also don't involve the quite low but still real risks of serious adverse events -- around three in 1,000, George said -- from angiograms.

The 2-metric-ton Aquilion One, which Johns Hopkins was among the first to install three years ago, isn't available everywhere. But George said earlier tests were done on less powerful equipment.

"We think there are advantages to having a 320, but this technique can be done on scanners with 64 and 128 detectors," he said.

A Toshiba spokeswoman told DOTmed News around 245 of the 320-slice CT scanners have been shipped worldwide.

But the researchers cautioned that it's too early to decide the clinical value of the tests until a larger study wraps up. In January, the researchers started the CORE 320 study. George said they're still enrolling patients, and hope to have around 400 by the time it finishes over the next year or so.

"We feel confident that the study shows great promise," he said.

Attending RSNA 2010? Interested in getting the most out of your CT scanner? Click here to learn about DOTmed's Forum, "How do you keep CT uptime costs down?" moderated by PBS Nightly Business Report senior correspondent Jeff Yastine.



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