Type:
Educational Exhibit
Keywords:
Volvulus, Trauma, Haemorrhage, eLearning, Contrast agent-oral, Contrast agent-intravenous, PACS, CT-Angiography, CT, Gastrointestinal tract, Anatomy, Abdomen
Authors:
A. P. Quispe Mauricio1, B. Diaz-Barroso1, A. Tenorio Gallardo2, A. Mejias Espada1, C. G. Linares Villavicencio1, M. A. Cruz Díaz1; 1Alcalá de Henares. Madrid/ES, 2Salamanca/ES
DOI:
10.1594/ecr2018/C-3223
Background
Abdominal pain,
nausea and vomiting are very frequent symptoms in patients who go to the emergency service.
These symptoms can be secondary to pathologies such as gastritis,
carcinoma,
lymphoma,
carcinoid,
metastasis,
bezoar or corrosive damage of the stomach.
Clinical and laboratory tests are frequently nonspecific,
so when faced with the suspicion of urgent gastric pathology,
CT will be the initial test of choice for diagnosis and treatment planning.
Endoscopy remains an important tool for assessing acute gastric disease,
although it is more invasive and not as readily available as CT.
The CT can evaluate the mural and extramural extension of the diseases,
having limitations when evaluating the mucosa.
Although the evaluation of the mucosa is poor in CT compared to endoscopy,
CT is very useful to identify inflammatory pathology (gastritis,
ulcers) and complications of gastric pathology (perforation,
obstruction and hemorrhage).
Advances in CT technology and three-dimensional postprocessing (3D) software have allowed endoscopic images based on CT (virtual endoscopy),
as well as accurate staging of neoplastic diseases of the stomach.
The acquisition of appropriate CT images requires patient fasting,
adequate gastric distension and a negative intraluminal contrast agent.