Lopez: I also think we have a really high level of capital costs that not a lot of other departments in the hospital have. It's not only the initial cost of equipment. I have a lot of friends and neighbors who say, 'how can that MRI cost $2,400? I was only in there for 30 minutes.' I have to remind them that they are paying not only for the technologists, but for the clerical behind it and the physician who reads it. They get a lot more information now from our imaging devices and it takes them longer to look at it. On top of that we have these huge capital dollars we have to put into it, and oh by the way, our MRI service budget is half a million dollars a year. I think when people understand that they would understand imaging a little better.

The technology is so advanced and we can do so much more with it, but they are looking at just the cost of imaging and not looking at how, because of that $1,500 - $2,000 CT scan, they didn't have to do that exploratory laparoscopic surgery. I think they've lost sight of that.


Developments and ongoing trends in the field

Olivi: Interventional procedures under CT guidance--while that is not really new research, it is really coming into the mainstream. There's going to be more and more surgeries that don't happen because of it and that is a good thing...I also think hybrid imaging with PET/CT--that's becoming pretty mainstream. We're going to see a lot more of that.

Lopez: CAD is also going to continue to increase--not only CAD in mammography, which is getting fairly popular now, but also in chest CTs and chest X-rays and so forth.

Olivi: As that increases I think you're going to see more direct therapies and image-guided biopsy, which again are going to fundamentally change surgery.

Uniting disparate departments

Lopez: Imaging is available not just in imaging departments. There is cardiology, the GU docs have it and the ER docs have it...all those people who manage departments that use imaging, we want them to know that this is a meeting that they can come to. We are trying to emphasize that this is a meeting for medical imaging leads, supervisors and managers and they can gain a lot of knowledge by coming here. We are trying to open up our doors and make sure they know they are included and can benefit from our meeting and our organization.

There is still more to come on the 2009 AHRA meeting and exhibition. Keep reading for vendor news and product launches.

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