Keywords:
Vascular, Head and neck, Emergency, CT, CT-Angiography, Diagnostic procedure, Ischaemia / Infarction
Authors:
N. Schmidt, L. Bonati, C. Glessgen, A. Jadczak, B. Stieltjes, K. Blackham; Basle/CH
DOI:
10.26044/ecr2019/C-2207
Results
22 experts completed the questionnaire: 17 neurologists,
1 angiologist,
2 radiologists and 2 vascular surgeons.
The experts were 7 residents (0-6 years of experience),
2 attending physicians in non- leading positions and 13 attending physicians in leading positions.
See Fig.
1.
10% of the experts stated they were receiving thematically sectioned reports in their clinic for more than one year.
10.5% of the experts read their patient’s radiologic reports on a regular basis.
86% declared their existing reports to be complete and 86% stated that they do not perceive the reports as having too much information.
50% of the experts indicated they would prefer a structured report,
27% would not prefer a structured report and 23% were indifferent.
See Fig.
4.
58% stated they would read the report more often if it was structured.
When asked about possible improvements for the reports,
there were similar answers asking for more established scores and structured assessments (e.g.
the Alberta Stroke Program Early CT ASPECT score or stenosis measurements following the North American Symptomatic Carotid Endarterectomy Trial NASCET method).
See Fig.3.
When asked to make a ranking for the most important findings in a report the descending order was: Vascular findings (e.g.
stenosis,
dissection),
percentage of stenosis (NASCET),
length of stenosis,
anatomical variants,
location of stenosis (e.g.
proximal/middle ICA),
plaque characteristics (e.g.
ulcerated),
tandem stenosis,
prior vascular therapies,
arteriosclerosis of the aortic arch,
type of aortic arc (1-3),
prior non- vascular therapies (e.g.
radiation),
tortuosity of the CCA/ICA,
height of the carotid bifurcation.
See Fig.
2.
The experts were asked if they would like detailed findings in every report or only in a report containing a clinical indication of stroke or for interdisciplinary treatment conferences.
The experts stated that the type of aortic arch and the height of the carotid bifurcation (in 56% and 40% each) should be only for the interdisciplinary therapy conferences,
all the other findings should be present for any report.
There were tendencies for all answers,
but every expert still seemed to have his/her unique opinion for every question and sometimes answers from different individuals differed widely.