Digital imagery helps save lives and limbs. (News).

Cutting-edge American technology in the hands of the soldiers on the small radiology staff of the 86th Combat Support Hospital at Camp Udairi, Kuwait, is making a difference for soldiers who have been wounded on the battlefield.

The technology is a Philips Digital Radiography system. The system works much like a digital camera, except the image is a radiograph showing bones and joints instead of a photo of a face or an arm.

A radiology technologist takes the image and stores the data on an imaging plate. The plate is placed into a processor, and the data are transferred to a laser scanner that converts the data to a digital image. "Once the image is in the computer, we can manipulate the image digitally," says Specialist Megan Allen, a radiology technologist. "The radiologist reads the image and passes the image to the surgeon. We then copy it to a CD. After surgery, as patients are transferred to the rear for follow-on care, the CD with the image goes with them."

Digital radiography does not require chemicals and flimsy x-ray sheets, which eliminates the need for requisitioning, transporting, and accounting for these additional supplies. Transporting and disposing of the hazardous material produced from using chemicals also is eliminated.

"It's definitely better than conventional film screen radiography," says Major Kathleen Groom, the combat support hospital's radiologist. "Images can be manipulated by magnification, inversion, adjustment of light, and contrast. I can review the image on the screen, or I can print the image out. The greatest benefit is [that] the process limits radiation exposure to the patient," she adds. "We can process and examine the x ray more quickly, which limits the time from x ray to treatment. And quality medical treatment is what it's all about here."