Medical Imaging | All About Medical Scans: CT, MRI, PET and SPECT

div class="googleright">A computed tomography scanner is an X-ray device.
As a large doughnutlike ring moves over and spins
Your doc has asked that you go for a medical scan toaround the body, the beams are sent through the body
take a closer look at what’s ailingfrom one side and the emerging radiation is detected
you—likely one of these tests: a CAT scan, aand forms images on the other. “When
SPECT scan, a PET scan, an ultrasound, anpatients go through a CAT scanner,” says
MRI—or some combination of these. So howScott Daniel Flamm, M.D., head of cardiovascular
will it help you? Here’s an overview of whatimaging at the Cleveland Clinic in Cleveland, “it
each medical imaging device does and whattakes a series of 3-D pictures or axial slices very
information it captures:quickly.
CT scans (aka CAT scans)