The radiologist who sits in a dark room, interpreting films and rendering a report that someone looks at 24 hours later is becoming a thing of the past, say radiologists. With new imaging technologies poised to revolutionize medicine, the demand for images increasing 5 percent each year and patients becoming more knowledgeable, radiologists are evolving to meet their quickly changing role in medicine and in society.

That role includes interacting more closely with referring physicians and patients within a fast-paced digital world, finding solutions to new threats and challenges, and evaluating and researching the latest technologies that give patients more options and hope than ever before.

Future technology
“I think the biggest, most exciting development is the coming of molecular medicine,” says Harvey Neiman, M.D., chairman of the American College of Radiology (ACR of Reston, Va.) board of chancellors, who takes over as executive director in January 2003. “Over the next 10 to 20 years, we’re going to see ever increasing uses of molecular imaging within mainstream medicine.”

By understanding the molecular basis of disease and developing methods to detect and treat changes in the body at the molecular level, physicians will be able to identify diseases in the earliest possible stages. Although the technology is in its infancy, cancer is one area physicians already are seeing progress. “We hope that we will be able to see early, pre-cancerous documentation of potential cancer growth,” says Neiman. “So rather than wait until a lesion is pinhead-sized or slightly larger, hopefully, with molecular imaging, we’ll be able to see it before the activity even has become cancer.” The technology may lead to accurate, high-volume cancer screening.

Combating cancer and arteriosclerotic vascular disease, another promising use, would make molecular medicine a fundamental tool to fight the two most deadly diseases in the United States. In the future, radiologists expect their jobs to entail more molecular imaging than the gross anatomy imaging of today.

Please refer to the November 2002 issue for the complete story. For information on article reprints, contact Martin St. Denis