Analyzing Historic Images in Radiology Databases Can Save Millions in Osteoporosis Costs

Swedish researchers have identified a way of easing the burden of future osteoporotic fractures by analyzing historic radiology images.

The study‘s findings were presented at the 2010 congress of the Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) annual meeting, held November 28-December 2, 2010, in Chicago (IL, USA).

Millions of Euros can be saved through a structured osteoporosis prevention program. A study of 8,257 patients at the Karolinska Institute (Stockholm, Sweden) used Sectra's (Linköping, Sweden) patented digital X-ray radiogrammetry (DXR) method to identify patients that subsequently suffered from a hip fracture.

Osteoporosis is an underdiagnosed and undertreated disease. In spite of a first fracture being a strong indicator of future osteoporotic fractures, only 10-20% of these patients are prescribed treatment. Convenient tools and systematic ways of working are essential to the detection of the disease. This study demonstrated that hospitals, regions, or even countries could easily single out the patients in need of treatment without adding more than Sectra's service, dxr-online, to images acquired in clinical practice. Today, most of all radiology images are digital and there is therefore a great potential to reduce the future cost of osteoporosis-related fractures using radiology databases.

The study's findings revealed that bone mineral density (BMD) is lower in patients who suffer from a hip fracture in subsequent years. Images taken in clinical practice of patients with low-energy fractures formed the basis of the study.

DXR is an automated method for estimating the distal forearm cortical bone mineral density from a standard X-ray. The majority of clinics in the developed world currently use digital modalities for X-ray and all that is needed to use Sectra's dxr-online service is a digital X-ray modality and an Internet connection. A hand X-ray image is captured at the clinic and sent to the Sectra online lab for analysis. The method has US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approval for use as a medical device, and it has been shown to forecast future fractures to the same extent as other peripheral BMD devices.

Related Links:
Karolinska Institute
Sectra