CT Scanner Acronyms and Phrases Defined

CT scanner terminology is the focus of this week's installment of our ongoing series. There are a lot of CT scan abbreviations that can leave you wondering what they stand for. Dig into the following and expand your radiology vocabulary!

ASiR: Adaptive Statistical iterative Reconstruction, noise and dose reduction software available with several models of GE CT and PET/CT. (GE Healthcare 2012)

AWW: Advantage Windows Workstation, found in GE product lines, used for post-processing diagnostics

Card IQ: Cardiac software option

CSCORE: Calcium Score, test used to detect calcium deposits found in atherosclerotic plaque in the coronary arteries (Cleveland Clinic 2012)

CT: Computerized Tomography, also known as CAT Scan, Computerized Axial Tomography

ECG/EKG: Electrocardiogram, monitors the electrical activity of patients’ hearts, aids with cardiac gating

FOV: Field of View

H1-3: Refers to gantry styles on GE CT’s.  H-1: box style, H-2: curved, found on LightSpeed Plus and some 16-slice systems, H-3: same curved looks as an H-2 with some different internal components 

LCD: Liquid Crystal Display

MHU: Million Heat Unit, refers to the “size” of the tube, i.e. the tube’s ability to dissipate heat

MIP: Maximum Intensity Projection, projection method used to build 3D images by stacking the slices taken during a scan

MPR: Multiplanar Reconstruction, a reconstruction method where a 3D image is built from individual slices then re-segmented by the software on different planes

POR: Plane of Rotation

RT: “Radiation Therapy”- oncology treatments

Slice: How many anatomical cross-sections are captured in 1 rotation

Syngo: Syngo is a Siemens software platform

VCT: Volume Computed Tomography, high-speed scanning

DAS: Data Acquisition System, processing components in the scanner's detector, collect the data from the scan

VRT: Volumetric Rendering Technique, “allow[s] rapid generation of a series of hi-quality 3D images in each plane of rotation that can be viewed as independent static images or as an animated real-time video loop.”

Worklist: Worklist is a software option that pulls patient and procedure data from the site network so the tech doesn't have to re-enter all the data on the scanner itself

If you need to know more, or already do, we want to hear from you. Contact us today with any CT scanner related needs or questions!