Street Anatomy

Have a headache? Try removing the bullet.

[via Daily Mail]

Imagine living with an agonizing headache for most of your life, only to realize that you’ve had a bullet lodged in your brain for 64 years.

This is exactly what happened to a Chinese grandmother, Jin Guangying, who is living headache free for the first time since she was 13, after having a rusty bullet removed from her brain.

In September 1943, Jin was delivering food to her father, a guerilla soldier stationed in a village near her home in Xiny County, China. She was shot in the head, just above her right ear, by the invading Japanese and immediately fell into a coma. The bullet had already passed through a man’s arm, losing enough momentum to remain inside her skull.

“When I woke up, I found I was at home. My mother had taken me back home, applied herbal medicine to my wound and dressed my head in layers of bandages,” said Jin.

Jin recovered in 3 months, but would suffer from relentless headaches for the next six decades.

“When she suffered from the headaches, she would sometimes babble words we could hardly understand, foaming at the mouth, and sometimes she pounded her head with her fist,” said Wang Zhengping, Jin’s daughter.

While the headaches grew worse over the years, her family could not afford to take her to the doctor.

Her family finally had to borrow money for an x-ray that revealed the 3cm long bullet. On May 3, 2007 after a 4 hour operation doctors removed the rusty bullet.

“If the bullet had passed through Jin’s head, she might have died immediately, because usually the wound left by a bullet leaving the human body will be much larger than the one created when it enters,” said Zhou Tang, head of surgery at the Renci Hospital of Suyang County.

MRIs: Exposing all our Faults

[via the Chicago Sun-Times]

So you’re thin, feel healthy, try to eat well, and the thought of exercising at least crosses your mind from time to time. Now according to imaging research at the Imperial College in London by Dr. Jimmy Bell, you’re most likely FAT on the inside.

“Some doctors now think that the internal fat surrounding vital organs such as the heart, liver or pancreas - invisible to the naked eye - could be as dangerous as the more obvious external fat that bulges underneath the skin.”

Dr. Bell aims to create “fat maps” to show where people store internal fat. Those of us who are thin but don’t exercise frequently are at the highest risk of having this dangerous internal fat which is linked to high cholesterol, high insulin, high triglycerides, high blood pressure, and other problems.

This body map shows skin in green, muscle in red, and yellow as internal fat.

“Without a clear warning signal, such as a rounder middle, doctors worry that thin people may be lulled into falsely assuming that because they’re not overweight, they’re healthy.”

So isn’t it bad enough that we have to worry about our external fat without having to worry about how much fat is cushioning our organs? What’s most troubling about this is that most people don’t know and will probably never know how much hidden fat they have because the only accurate way to determine it is with an MRI scan. But it is not feasible nor safe to give all of those people MRI scans.

So what can we do to burn off the internal fat? Exercise and improve your diet. But you don’t need an MRI to tell you that.

Read one of the many news articles on this topic via MSNBC

Virtopsy

I wrote a couple of posts a while back about virtual autopsy.

Tracing the Bullet Wound: Virtual Autopsy
Virtual Autopsy: Visualizing the consequences of getting run over by a steamboat

The University of Bern, Switzerland is the world leader in virtual autopsy (virtopsy) research. I wanted to share with you this video they produced detailing the entire virtual autopsy procedure. Forensic science has always been a fascinating field, but now with the introduction of medical imaging technology, it’s getting even more exciting.

Click here to watch the video!

Virtual Colonoscopy: an appealing alternative

Medical imaging modalities such as CT and MRI scans can be combined to produce incredible 3D images of human anatomy. The technology is improving everyday and images are becoming easier to work with. One area where medical imaging has the opportunity to help saves lives is in the colon. Virtual colonoscopy is a relatively new and upcoming way to effectively screen for colon cancer.

What is Virtual Colonoscopy?

Virtual Colonoscopy (VC) combines detailed imaging technology (MRI and CT scans) with advanced graphics software to make exquisite, highly accurate 3D images of the inside of your colon. Doctors can then “fly” through the colon to explore areas of cancer without the need for a conventional colonoscopy. The result is a set of images that provide a radiologist with essentially the same sort of view of the colon, as a gastroenterologist would have by doing a regular colonoscopy. VC is able to accurately detect polyps 10mm in diameter. The advantages really have to do with the fact that the technique is relatively quick, fairly sensitive, and only minimally invasive.

Why is it Important?

Colon cancer is the second leading cause of cancer deaths (after lung cancer) in the United States. I don’t think many people realize just how prevalent it is. What may strike most people, however, is just how preventable colon cancer really is. If cancerous growths are detected early, patients have a 90% chance of surviving. Unfortunately, relatively few people undergo colonoscopies. This can be life threatening because many individuals with colon cancer have no symptoms until the disease reaches an advanced. Cancer screening can find dangerous polyps (abnormal growths in the colon or rectum) so that they can be removed before turning into cancer. From a public health perspective, virtual colonoscopy could save many lives.

How is it performed?

Unfortunately you are still required to take laxatives or other oral agents at home a day or two before the procedure to clear stool from your colon. They’re actually working to improve VC so that stool can simply be ‘deleted’ or ignored in the 3D images.

So, the doctor will ask you to lie on your back on a table. A thin tube will be carefully inserted into your rectum, and air will be pumped through the tube to inflate the colon for better viewing.

The table moves through the scanner to produce a series of two-dimensional cross-sections along the length of the colon. The scan takes about 10 minutes and you will be asked to hold your breath for a short while during the scan so that the images won’t be distorted through movement.

After the exam, the information from the scanner must be processed to compose the series of 2D cross-sections into a 3D image of your colon. A radiologist will then evaluate the results to identify any abnormalities.

Advantages

VC is obviously more comfortable than conventional colonoscopy because it does not use an invasive colonoscope. Real colonoscopies are uncomfortable and run the risk of perforating the wall of the colon, putting the patient at risk of a deadly infection. It is also unable to see the entire colon in 1 out of 10 people. No sedation is needed and you can return to your usual activities or go home after the procedure without the aid of another person. VC takes less time than either a conventional colonoscopy or a lower GI series.

Normal colonoscopy compared to virtual colonoscopy
Disadvantages

The doctor cannot take tissue samples or remove polyps during VC, so a conventional colonoscopy must be performed anyway if polyps are found. VC does not show as much detail as a conventional colonoscopy, so polyps smaller than 10mm in diameter may not show up in the 3D image.

Get Screened

Any invasive procedure can be dangerous so you want to have a colonoscopy only when you actually need to operate or remove a polyp, rather than just for routine screening. A colonoscopy is not a procedure anyone looks forward to having performed. But, guidelines indicate everyone should be screened beginning at age 50. Unfortunately, many people choose to postpone this important test until symptoms force them to seek help. Virtual Colonoscopy provides an appealing alternative to conventional colonoscopy, which will hopefully encourage more people to be screened, because colon cancer doesn’t have to be the second leading cause of cancer deaths in the U.S.

And with that, here’s a poster I designed to help get people motivated.

New Image Resource Link

I just stumbled across the Heal National Digital Library that offers free, high-quality digital materials for health sciences education. You can find medical illustrations, scans, dissection photos, and even health education videos on this website.