McCormick Place, Chicago, IL -- The heavy hitter of the imaging world -- the RSNA -- put on its annual show this week. DOTmed went as an exhibitor, and the DOTmed News Team went to see and hear what's new. Here are our impressions:

TRAFFIC:
While traffic was high at DOTmed's Booth -- we will probably have met by the end of the Show today about 1,000 people -- overall the feeling among exhibitors and attendees alike was the Show attendance was about the same as last year, or perhaps even down a little. The consensus opinion was that the DRA reimbursement cuts which went into effect at the beginning of the year kept many of the operators of free-standing imaging centers at home this time.

NEW PRODUCTS:
There were several exciting new technologies on display at the Show, with the most "buzz" circling around Toshiba's Aquilion One CT, with its 320 0.5mm detectors that can capture a 16cm wide image in a single pass.

For those on a budget, Siemens' Essenza 1.5T MRI also garnered a great deal of interest. The system's $800,000 price point was particularly attractive to the smaller Community Hospitals and the free-standing imaging centers. A lot of people also got their first look at Siemens' hand-held Acuson P10 ultrasound unit -- what they call their "pocket ultrasound," which lists for about $10,000.

At the high end, Philips' 256-slice Brilliance iCT had lots of tire-kickers, but we're not sure how many takers there will be. But its fast acquisition time and great image quality may make it hard to resist.

As for the hot "concept car" of the Show, some saw it in GE's "Gemstone Detector." While it's still going to be quite a while before this technology is on the market -- although it is in beta trails -- this 98% garnet-2% rare earths crystal is touted by the company as the first advance in CT detector technology in 20 years. GE claims it is faster and more efficient, and is optically near-perfect which increased image resolution.

Along with GE's Gemstone technology, their were many other companies showing tantalizing looks at what "will be" some day. One of the areas where a great deal of development is happening is with image manipulation, display, and sharing. Futuristic touch screen systems were on display and drew big crowds, such as Philips' Reading Room 20/20. GE also is working on super user-friendly reader stations.

The other major theme many companies were pushing, with a lot of promises down the road, is in the area of molecular imaging. PET is the dominant modality still in molecular studies (which is now firmly married to PET/CT), and will no doubt stay in that position for years to come. But the big imaging companies are working behind the scenes on yet-to-be-announced projects that hopefully will take diagnostic imaging to a whole, new, personal level.

That's a quick and partial summary of the goings-on at RSNA this year. There are many other RSNA stories in this issue you should read, and we'll have more next week -- once our feet stop aching!

And be sure to check out our RSNA Photo Galleries in this Edition of the News.

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