Worcester Telegram and Gazette Article

by Geraldine A. Collier TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
	orcester - Hey, look me over. Curious to know what's
going on below those layers of skin and fat that protect your vital organs? Do you think medical professionals are any different? Nope. Take the men and women who work at Chadwick Medical Associates on Grove Street. Most of the 50-member staff have put their names into a fishbowl, hoping that, during downtime in the radiology department, they will be chosen to play "patient" for the new $1 million-plus ultrafast CT scanner, part of a new generation of imaging technology that recently arrived in Worcester. The curiosity factor is equally strong among radiologists over at Worcester Medical Center, where they are eager to test for themselves some of the $8 million to $10 million in new imaging devices, including

two ultrafast CT scanners, which were purchased for the new downtown facility.
"Most of our radiologists have been through the machine (both institutions are using the Picker Multislice CT Imaging System) already," said Dr. Paul Sabel, acting chief of the Department of Radiology at Worcester Medical center.
How fast are ultrafast, multislice scanners? Well, the scanner can examine the human body in less than 30 seconds. "It takes longer to get a patient on the table and get him ready than it does to take the picture," said one staffer at Chadwick Medical Associates.
Not only will the ultrafast scanners do all the jobs that most of the old scanners do, but because of its speed, it can handle a unique chore: finding calcium deposits in arteries.
"It has always been difficult to obtain clear images of blood vessels around the heart, due to constant heart motion," said Dr. Robert E.


	by T&G Staff / JIM COLLINS

In the Worcester Medical Center Radiology Department, Dr. Diane Messersmith, left, assisted by Dr. Paul Sabel, acting chief of the Radiology Department, performs a percutaneous nephrostomy, in which a tube is inserted into the kidney to drain it, accompanied by a miniature camera. The doctors watch the procedure on monitors located over the bed. The relatively non-invasive procedure was used to unblock a kidney.


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