Pages show change continues to be only constant in radiology

One definition of news is recording the words and deeds of individual men and women. Another is chronicling change. For Diagnostic Imaging, with one leg in technology and the other in clinical practice, the latter definition works very well. Looking at this issue's table of contents, it strikes me that change in radiology is occurring at a pretty rapid pace.

Take our section on computer-aided diagnosis. When I started working with DI in late 1997, CAD was largely experimental and confined to mammography. In this issue, one of the leading thinkers in CAD, the University of Chicago's Kunio Doi, Ph.D., looks at a not-too-distant future where CAD easily moves to other organ systems and modalities (page 37). Similarly, interventional radiology back in 1997 mainly involved vascular and biopsy procedures. In this issue, we have interventional radiologists pondering cosmetic procedures like Botox injections (page 19).

In our special Enterprise Imaging & IT supplement, 3D images, once a parlor trick in radiology, have become so valuable that discussion now includes how best to provide them (page 13). PACS has become so ubiquitous that concerns involve its ergonomic impacts (page 9), along with some observations about how PACS is fundamentally altering the way radiologists practice (pages 9 and 40).

In fact, in every issue since Diagnostic Imaging was started in 1979, rapid change has been part of radiology's picture. Our aim is to portray it accurately and fairly in a way that helps you better understand the world in which you practice.

-Mr. Hayes is editor of Diagnostic Imaging.