Massachusetts General Hospital is set to pilot a new research program to assess for the first time the use of NeuroLogica’s OmniTom Elite CT with Photon Counting Detector technology in an ICU setting.

The two will evaluate how well the PCD technology with the scanner can diagnose and clinicians make decisions around the treatment for patients at the point-of-care, while limiting the need for extra transport. "Photon Counting CT has a dual benefit of multi-spectral imaging and high-resolution imaging. Multi-spectral imaging could benefit contrast-enhanced imaging, tissue differentiation and quantification, metal artifact reduction and segmentation. High-resolution imaging of the head using PCD can benefit trauma imaging, allowing for evaluation of damage to the small structures within the nasal cavity and ear canal," David Webster, chief operating officer at NeuroLogica Corp., told HCB News.

The addition of PCD technology to the OmniTom Elite scanner is expected to potentially allow for more accurate visualization and segmentation of bone, blood clots, plaque, hemorrhage and intracranial tumors in ICU patients. Photon counting enables this through the way in which it arranges the different energies of X-rays after they pass through the scan field. It was recently used for the first time in cardiac scanning at Mayo Clinic as part of a collaboration with Siemens Healthineers and was fast enough to “freeze” the motion of the heart to capture a small fraction of one heartbeat.
In addition, PCD could potentially change the use of injected contrast agents for highlighting blood vessels by collecting high signal even at low contrast agent dosage and capturing CT data in multiple energy bands that provide information on material composition for different tissues and contrast media.

“We are particularly interested in how this technology can help guide patient care decisions through quantitative image analysis,” said Dr. Raj Gupta, director of the ultra-high-resolution volume CT lab at MGH, in a statement.

The OmniTom Elite with PCD is a product of NeuroLogica and Samsung that provides versatile, real-time mobile imaging to administer point-of-care CT to critical patients.

MGH plans to use the OmniTom Elite with PCD during the pilot to guide best practices and evaluate use cases for the novel system. It will specifically use it to monitor post-trauma and post-surgical patients.

PCD technology is FDA-pending.

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