Imaging atherosclerotic plaque inflammation.

Inflammation within atherosclerotic plaques is one of the main drivers of atherosclerotic plaque rupture, which frequently leads to clinical events such as myocardial infarction and stroke. Current gold standard techniques such as X-ray angiography and ultrasound can rapidly report on luminal encroachment but give no readout on inflammatory state of the plaque. We summarize several alternative imaging techniques--CT, MRI, and nuclear imaging--that are close to the clinical arena, and we provide the relative advantages of each.

Early radiotherapy dose response and lack of hypersensitivity effect in normal brain tissue: a sequential dynamic susceptibility imaging study of cerebral perfusion.

Aims: To determine if magnetic resonance perfusion markers can be used as an analytical marker of subclinical normal brain injury after radiotherapy, by looking for a dose-effect relationship.

Materials And Methods: Four patients undergoing conformal radiotherapy to 54Gy in 30 fractions for low-grade gliomas were imaged with conventional T(2)-weighted and fluid attenuated inversion recovery imaging as well as dynamic contrast susceptibility perfusion imaging. Forty regions of interest were determined from the periventricular white matter.

Prevalence of cystic paraurethral structures in asymptomatic women at endovaginal and perineal sonography.

Aim: To prospectively assess the prevalence of paraurethral cystic structures in asymptomatic adult women.

Patients And Methods: One hundred and forty consecutive women undergoing endovaginal sonography with no history of lower urinary tract symptoms.

Results: Paraurethral cystic structures were identified in 4/140 subjects (2.