Reston, Va. - As CT Colonography (CTC) gains greater acceptance as a screening tool for colorectal cancer, radiologists must be prepared for patients who will need further screening due to the incidence of extracolonic findings (ECFs), according to Lincoln L. Berland, M.D., author of Incidental Extracolonic Findings on CT Colonography: The Impending Deluge and Its Implications.

Several studies examined by the author have tested the effectiveness of CTC for detecting colon polyps and the frequency of ECFs. Berland notes that the cost of pursuing and managing these ECFs may be greater than the cost of the original CTC. However, a great benefit of detecting ECFs may be in added life-years from treating abdominal aortic aneurysms, in which detection occurred more often than from incidentally-discovered extracolonic cancers. The ACR's Commission on Body Imaging is currently developing a system for defining and reporting incidental findings.

The ACR's RADPEER™ program was created to allow peer review to be performed during the routine interpretation of images. Since it's inception in 2002, there has been discussion over the scoring, categorization of data, and scoring consistency which are discussed in the RADPEER™ Scoring White Paper, by Valerie P. Jackson, M.D., et al. After reviewing literature and various scoring methods, the ACR task force proposed to build upon the current scoring system, which will include a better explanation of scores, as well as an option for radiologists to provide opinions.
Breast Cancer Awareness

The Power of Pink: Cause-Related Marketing and the Impact on Breast Cancer by Jennifer A. Harvey, M.D., and Michal A. Strahilevitz, Ph.D., examines the relationship between nonprofit and for-profit organizations in their efforts to create awareness for breast cancer. This article looks at both the positive impact of cause-related marketing -- such as heightened awareness of the disease and increase in screening efforts -- with potential negatives, such as misuse of the pink ribbon symbol and exaggeration of funds donated to the cause through consumer purchases.

Informed Consent Documentation

Though informed-consent forms were intended to educate patients, they can often be difficult to understand. In the article, Patient-Physician Communication: Informed Consent for Imaging-Guided Spinal Injection, D. Lee Bennett, M.D., M.A., et al., placed more than 100 patients into three groups and studied their recall, anxiety, and pain during their procedure. In this prospective, randomized, controlled study, the diagram method -- in which patients viewed a set of diagrams illustrating 12 key points before signing an informed-consent form -- was most successful in terms of patient recall of the information and increased the interaction between the physician the patient.

The January issue of JACR is an important resource for radiology and nuclear medicine professionals as well as students seeking clinical and educational improvement. The ACR now offers CME credit to its members for one article in each issue of JACR. For more information, visit www.jacr.org.

The ACR is a national professional organization serving more than 32,000 radiologists, radiation oncologists, interventional radiologists, nuclear medicine physicians and medical physicists with programs focusing on the practice of radiology and the delivery of comprehensive health care services.

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