Toshiba Aplio 500Toshiba displayed its Smart Fusion ultrasound technology at the Society of Interventional Radiology conference March 22-27 in San Diego. The software, available on Toshiba’s premier Aplio 500 ultrasound system, improves visualization and location of lesions by pairing live ultrasound with previously acquired CT and MR scans on the same screen.

“Smart Fusion has allowed us to save patients from getting open surgical biopsies and increased our confidence in identifying the right lesion accurately, safely and quickly,” said Dr. Van Young, interventional radiologist, St Elizabeth Healthcare. “We’ve seen procedure times decrease from 30 to 15 minutes because of the ability to find smaller and difficult-to-access lesions during ultrasound-guided biopsies. Another significant benefit of Smart Fusion is reducing dose to patients and physicians by lowering the number of CT-only guided biopsies.”

“Toshiba’s advancements in ultrasound technology are expanding its applications so healthcare providers can feel confident in using a safe, inexpensive and accurate modality,” said Tomohiro Hasegawa, director of the ultrasound business unit for Toshiba. “For example, if a biopsy or ablation can be performed with ultrasound instead of CT, even if it takes the same amount of time, the healthcare provider will benefit from using the more cost-effective system while reducing radiation exposure to the patient and clinician.

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