Biomedical subjects
Publications and source records attributed to E Mannes.
With beginning of the year 2004 a new documentation sheet for occupational preventive medical examinations according to exposures to mineral dust (quartz, asbestos, ceramic fibres) will replace the existing sheet. The new investigation sheet is presented in this publication and changes are described.
The computed tomographic (CT) and ultrasound (US) appearances of 5 adrenal myelolipomas in 4 patients are reported. The component tissues of a myelolipoma determine its CT and US appearance. A myelolipoma consisting primarily of fat has a characteristic CT and US appearance. A myelolipoma also containing macroscopic quantities of nonfatty material (blood, calcium, or myeloid tissue) may have a nonspecific CT or US appearance if fat is not identified in the lesion. In equivocal cases, needle biopsy may be used to establish the diagnosis of myelolipoma.
A number of pitfalls related to the urinary bladder may be encountered during ultrasound examination of the pelvis. Examples of particularly difficult or frequently encountered situations are illustrated in this report. In our experience, difficulties most commonly arise from incorrect identification of the urinary bladder, with an abnormal cystic pelvic mass simulating the normal urinary bladder, or vice versa. In addition, confusing appearances may be caused by urine refluxed into the vagina, technical artifacts, bladder diverticula, or mobile pelvic masses displaced by the bladder. Definitive bladder identification is useful to avoid errors in situations likely to be associated with bladder related pitfalls.
A wide variety of in vitro tests, some too sophisticated to perform in a clinical setting, is available to provide information on the performance of sonographic transducers. However, it is a common belief among many clinicians that clinically generated in vivo images are a necessary and sufficient test of sonographic image quality. In order to examine the sensitivity and reliability of quality judgments made from clinical images, some transducers that failed elaborate in vitro tests were used to create clinical scans. In a discrimination test between clinical images created by normal and abnormal transducers, a panel of experienced sonographers was unable to consistently identify scans made by transducers with major flaws in the beam uniformity when the defect occurred only in the near field. The study confirms that rigorous in vitro tests provide unique information on transducer performance and can reveal performance flaws that are overlooked in routine clinical images.