The UPMC Department of Radiology had a great showing at this year’s Association of University Radiologists (AUR) meeting in Baltimore, Maryland. Sina Houshmand, a second year resident in the Diagnostic Radiology residency program was selected as a presenter at the ACR-AUR Research Scholar Program, and received a $1000 award to attend the Annual Meeting of the AUR. Dr. Ashok Muthukrishnan mentored Dr. Houshmand on his project, entitled “Feasibility of post-therapy quantitative Lu-177-Dotatate SPECT/CT in patients with metastatic neuroendocrine tumor: comparison with clinical outcomes.”

Fellowship is one of the most prestigious honors granted to members of the Society of Interventional Radiology. This year, there were 40 inductees from throughout the US and abroad. Less than 10% of SIR members are elected to Fellowship status, and election signifies a long and consistent history of activities with substantial contributions to the field of Interventional Radiology at large and to the Society.

Low dose CT lung cancer screening has been performed at UPMC since 1991. The Pittsburgh Lung Cancer Screening Study (PLuSS) was one of the first studies to assess the role of low dose CT for screening of high risk populations for early lung cancer. Those screening studies were funded by research grants and the CT scans were obtained on Saturdays at Hillman Cancer Center. The PLuSS study was one of the first high volume low dose lung cancer screening research studies in the country and it demonstrated the benefit of low dose CT scans for the early diagnosis of lung cancer.

UPMC then participated in the National Lung Cancer Screening Trial (NLST) which was a large multicenter study. The study definitively proved the value of low dose lung cancer screening with a 20% decrease in disease specific mortality.

UPMC RSNA Book 2018
Once again, UPMC radiology was well represented at RSNA this year. Faculty and trainees gave 11 scientific sessions, prepared 4 educational exhibits and lectured in 9 refresher/educational courses. Dr. Rath chaired the RSNA Educational Exhibits Awards committee, and as track committee chairs, Drs. Tublin and Zuley assembled outstanding ultrasound and breast refresher course series. Faculty, trainees and many alumni again enjoyed a spectacular Tuesday night reception. The alumni network continues to expand, and it was great to again hear of the accomplishments of our many outstanding alumni.

The UPMC Interventional Radiology Division is delighted to congratulate Paula Novelli, MD on being awarded grants from the both the Magee-Womens Research Institute & Foundation and the Beckwith Institute for 2018. The grants, totaling $30,000, were earned by Dr. Novelli in support of her Quality Initiative "Developing a Simulator-Based Curriculum for Teaching Vascular and Interventional Radiology”. The grants will be used to defray the cost of a Mentice VIST G5 Angiographic simulator which will be housed at the WISER Center. The quality initiative is also being supported by matching funds from the Department of Radiology and will be used as part of the formal Interventional Radiology educational curriculum.

At the end of September Dr. Jules Sumkin (Chairman), Dr. Andrew Cordle (Musculoskeletal imaging), Dr. Anish Ghodadra (Interventional Radiology), Dr. Alessandro Furlan (Abdominal Imaging) and Dr. Shandong Wu (Breast imaging) travelled to Shanghai, China as guest speakers at the 60th anniversary academic conference of Chinese diagnostic ultrasound in medicine.

Please click the image to view the full paper. ➥

Reference:
Sarah S. Aboutalib, Aly A. Mohamed, Wendie A. Berg, Margarita L. Zuley, Jules H. Sumkin and Shandong Wu, "Deep Learning to Distinguish Recalled but Benign Mammography Images in Breast Cancer Screening," Clinical Cancer Research, Oct 2018.


AACR newsroom:
https://www.aacr.org/Newsroom/Pages/News-Release-Detail.aspx?ItemID=1231