CT scan detects lung blood clots

In a latest medical breakthrough, a new type of scan to detect potentially deadly blood clots in the lungs has been discovered. Every year, blood clots in the lungs affect 2,50,000 people in the US. And because of the apparent difficulty in diagnosing the condition, most people don't get the right treatment. The older technique of detecting blood clots in the lungs involved the inhalation of radioactive material into lungs and its injection into the blood stream to rule out the presence of these clots. In the recent years, a CT scan has increasingly replaced this technique to rule out pulmonary embolism. To assess the efficacy of the CT scan in detecting blood clots of the lungs, researchers at the Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia followed 1,417 patients between the years 2001 and 2005. This involved comparing the usefulness of computed tomography or CT angiography with the older ventilation-perfusion scans. The results showed that the CT scan worked as well as the older technique in ruling out pulmonary embolism. It was found that the CT scan found 5 percent more clots as compared to the older technique used for detecting blood clots of the lungs. These results demonstrate the usefulness of CT scanning in diagnosing blood clots of the lungs.