Kevin is famous and in the papers!

Portable scanner doing double duty
By Jordan Burke
Deseret Morning News
AMERICAN FORK — A portable new machine used by Intermountain Healthcare hospitals is helping Utah cancer victims from Ogden to St. George get faster tests and better results.
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Jason Olson, Deseret Morning News
Kevin Schaeffer performs a PET/CT scan on a patient. The device is mainly used for cancer imaging.
The machine, a GE Lightspeed, combines CT scanner and PET scanner into one device. Though the instruments aren't new individually, the combination is a recent development. By including both scanners together, doctors can get better results.
Here's how the machine works: First, patients are placed on a movable bed that fits into the PET/CT scanner. The patient undergoes the CT scan, which takes 25 seconds. Then, without moving the patient from machine to another one, which could cause irregularities in scan images, the computer-operated bed slides into the PET scanner for imaging, which takes 25 minutes.
The machine does have other uses, but "cancer is far and away the No. 1 reason," said Daniel Rasband, a diagnostic radiologist at American Fork Hospital.
To get more precise readings for possible cancer growths, doctors inject patients with a radioactive substance called FDG. When scanned, the liquid lights up cancer cells, making it easier for doctors to diagnose correctly.
Currently, the machine can scan six to eight patients a day, depending on the tests.
As of yet, Intermountain Healthcare doesn't have a full-time scanner in Utah County. The one in use at American Fork Hospital comes in a custom-built trailer. It spends two days a week in American Fork, one day in St. George and two more days in Ogden, said Janet Frank, an Intermountain Healthcare spokeswoman.
Intermountain Health- care is considering building a machine for Utah Valley Regional Medical Center, Rasband said.
The scanner is no small instrument. It costs about $3 million and weighs about 55,000 pounds.
"There's enough lead in this thing to drop it right through the parking garage," Rasband said.

Monday, December 4, 2006

We had a poor start to the week as Kevo did not make it to work. He called up at the ungodly hour of 6:15 in the morning to say that he was not feeling well. Then he launched into a ten minute soliloquy of the various ailments that had been affecting his body this weekend. I will spare you the retelling of such dire things, as anyone but those with a sufficiently strong gut could handle such stories without throwing up themselves. We think that he is faking and is just donig Christmas shopping, but since we are first on his list, we cannot complain too much.