Bone Mineral Densitometry: Osteoporosis
When undetected, the bone loss that accompanies osteoporosis, "the silent disease," can have a permanent impact on the overall health of a patient. One in three women, and one in five men over 50 will experience osteoporotic fractures.1,2,3 In women over 45 years of age, osteoporosis accounts for more days spent in hospital than many other diseases, including diabetes, myocardial infarction and breast cancer.4 The good news is that GE Lunar technology can help clinicians prevent and detect osteoporosis. GE Lunar has a broad range of efficient, comprehensive bone mineral density (BMD) and portable bone ultrasonometer solutions that can help clinicians differentiate their practice, helping more patients detect bone loss earlier.

MR-guided Focused Ultrasound: Uterine Fibroid Treatment

GE also showcased the only non-invasive surgical treatment available for uterine fibroids in the United States. GE and InSightec, a company that develops non-invasive therapy systems, developed the world's first magnetic resonance (MR) image guided focused ultrasound system. MRgFUS technology combines MR - to visualize the body anatomy, plan the treatment and monitor treatment outcome in real time - and high intensity focused ultrasound to thermally ablate tumors inside the body non-invasively. InSightec's ExAblate 2000 system, approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in October 2004, works exclusively in combination with GE's Signa MR system to non-invasively treat symptomatic uterine fibroids.

Clinical Education: Fetal Heart Monitoring
The new Electronic Fetal Heart Monitoring Interpretation and Management Education Program can help enhance communication among healthcare providers by promoting standardization of fetal heart monitoring (FHR) definitions and interpretation.

Developed by nationally recognized fetal monitoring experts Frank Miller, M.D.,
FACOG and David Miller, M.D., FACOG, this Web-based, interactive education program reinforces the standardized National Institute of Child Health and Human Development(NICHD) definitions of FHR patterns.

Integrated IT Solutions
In perinatal, technology is crucial for delivering insight to the point of care. GE demo-ed its latest release of Centricity Perinatal (CPN) 6.8, a clinician software package that combines the company's long-time expertise in labor & delivery with enhancements to its neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) capability. As the percentage of babies arriving in NICU continues to rise, CPN 6.8 helps to foster their development with enhanced NICU-specific capabilities, including: Mother-Baby Link, which automatically populates the infant's record with relevant maternal and delivery information; NICU Chalkboards, a quick, dynamically updated unit overview for a simple, yet comprehensive view that can be customized for a variety of purposes; and Advanced Reporting, which generates data that facilitates benchmarking specific to a particular care initiative to enhance unit performance. The solution also completes Perinatal Continuum of Care by making prenatal data from GE Healthcare's Centricity Electronic Medical Record (EMR) located in many private practice environments, available in Centricity Perinatal at the hospital, and closes the loop by sending a delivery summary back to Centricity EMR in the office.

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