St. Mary’s Sacred Heart Now Using 3-D Imaging System

IMG_9808St. Mary’s Sacred Heart Hospital is now accepting patients for their new 3-D imaging system.

On Wednesday, a special mobile unit was set up outside the hospital to offer hospital employees and citizens in the community a chance to come and see the new system and talk with the experts.

The system will be used primarily for mammograms.

Jeff Brown, Director of Radiology and Cardiology Services for St. Mary’s Health Care System says the  Hologic Genius 3D Mammography will offer much more precise imaging.

“This uses a principle called tomography,, which takes multiple pictures,” Brown said. “This allows the radiologist to see through tissue better because we’re actually taking pictures in slices. So instead of having one picture, you might have 50 pictures. 50 pictures in one millimeter segments from the next, which allows the radiologist to pan through from one image to the next.”

Brown said the radiologist will be able to better view images from ladies with dense breast tissue. That means the radiologist can see 41% more breast cancers earlier than with the 2-D system.

But Brown said this is still a type of x-ray and should not be confused with an MRI.

“It’s similar in that we’re doing cross-sectional imaging, but we are using radiation and MRI’s don’t use radiation, it uses electromagnetic waves,” he said. “But we’re not increasing the dose (of radiation).

Brown said St. Mary’s chose the Hologic 3-D imaging system over several other 3-D systems because the radiation dose on their machines was lower than their competitors.

Brown said the technicians in the radiology department of Sacred Heart Hospital have been training all this week and began taking patients for mammograms on the 3-D system Wednesday.