Press releases are distributed to the media throughout the week highlighting research presented at RSNA 2022. RSNA’s media outreach helps increase public awareness of radiology and its role in personal health care. Attend these sessions today or access on demand at Meeting.RSNA.org.
High Deductible Leads Women to Skip Testing after Abnormal Mammogram
Over 21% of women would forgo additional testing after an abnormal mammogram if they had to pay a deductible, according to a new study. Researchers at Boston Medical Center and Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine also found that 18% of women would skip their screening mammogram if required to pay out-of-pocket. Researchers surveyed 932 patients presenting for breast imaging at Boston Medical Center between September 2021 and February 2022. The survey was comprised of demographic questions on race, education level, annual household income and insurance payor, as well as scenarios about utilization of breast imaging. The groups with the highest percentage of responses indicating they would skip additional imaging were Hispanic (33.0%), high school educated or less (31.0%), household income less than $35,000 (27.0%) and Medicaid/uninsured (31.5%).
“Effect of a High Deductible Health Plan on Patients Willingness to Undergo Indicated Breast Imaging” (T7-SSBR06-3)
Steroid Injections Worsen Knee Arthritis
Two studies comparing injections commonly used to relieve knee osteoarthritis pain found that corticosteroid injections were associated with disease progression. In the first study, researchers from the University of California, San Francisco directly compared 210 patients who received corticosteroid or hyaluronic acid injections to a control group of 140 who did not. Statistical analysis showed that corticosteroid knee injections were significantly associated with the overall progression of osteoarthritis in the knee, specifically in the lateral meniscus, lateral cartilage and medial cartilage. Compared to the control group, the group who received hyaluronic injections showed a decreased progression of osteoarthritis, specifically in bone marrow lesions. In the second study, researchers at the Chicago Medical School of Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science conducted a case-control study comparing the radiographic progression of osteoarthritis in 100 patients who received injections of corticosteroids and hyaluronic acid with 50 patients who did not. Researchers found that patients injected with corticosteroids had significantly more osteoarthritis progression when compared to patients who received an injection of hyaluronic acid or no treatment at all.
“Impact of Intra-Articular Knee Injections on the Progression of Knee Osteoarthritis: Data From the Osteoarthritis Initiative (OAI) Cohort” (T1-SSMK05-5)
“Medial Joint Space Narrowing and Kellgren-Lawrence Progression following Intraarticular Corticosteroid Injections compared to Hyaluronic Acid Injections and Nontreated Patients” (T1-SSMK05-04)
AI Predicts Heart Disease Risk Using Single X-Ray
Researchers have developed a deep learning model that uses a single chest X-ray to predict the 10-year risk of death from a heart attack or stroke, stemming from atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease. The new study is from the Cardiovascular Imaging Research Center at Massachusetts General Hospital and the AI in Medicine program at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. Researchers trained the deep learning model and developed it to predict the risk of cardiovascular disease death. The model was tested using a cohort of 11,430 outpatients who had a routine outpatient chest X-ray at Mass General Brigham and were potentially eligible for statin therapy. There was a significant association between the risk predicted by the CXR-CVD risk deep learning model and observed major cardiac events.
“Deep Learning to Predict 10-year Cardiovascular Risk from Chest Radiographs” (T3-SSCH04-1)
