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Ultrasound: Past, Present, And Future

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Ultrasound has become a diagnostic tool used in medicine over the past 40 years. This new imaging tool has helped patients and physicians. It has become commonplace in the medical community to order diagnostic ultrasounds for various conditions including pregnancy, cardiac disease and gastrointestinal diseases. Medicine continues to see many new advances for ultrasound.
Medical centers all over the world use ultrasound to help aid in diagnosis of many medical conditions. Ultrasound also helps to follow therapy and treatment success in patients. However, in the United States; ultrasound is not readily available to all patients due to the cost in acquiring the service and the expense of the equipment. Not every hospital offers ultrasounds. Ultrasound …show more content…

A machine can be purchased new or refurbished. Refurbished machines are less expensive but may not contain the newest technology. They may not have the screen resolution of a newer machine. The tradeoff is a lower cost of the machine. A refurbished machine may be half the cost of a newer machine. A facility can also lease a machine for its use. New and refurbished machine can also be leased. One big advantage of leasing is when a newer model comes out, they can trade it in. Leasing also allows a facility to obtain the service without the high upfront costs of the ultrasound equipment (Orenstein). The leasing company also services the equipment as …show more content…

They also use ultrasound to aid in diagnosis of decreased blood flow to the legs and even abnormal liver function (Sanders). The medical profession is using ultrasound in new exciting ways continually. Large research centers are studying ultrasound in many different capacities. Emergency departments are now using bedside ultrasound machines to help aid in the diagnosis of traumatic abdominal and chest injuries. Bedside ultrasound machines provide information rapidly in life-threatening and time-sensitive conditions that is often unavailable in a timely manner (Vieira). Virtually every medical specialty uses ultrasound in their scope of practice. Since there is no radiation exposure, doctors are more comfortable ordering this test on their patients.
The insurance companies prefer ultrasound over other modalities of imaging a patient due to the lower cost as compared to a CT scan or MRI. They also are concerned about patient health. They prefer ultrasound due to the lack of radiation exposure. A great advantage of an ultrasound is that most structures that are not well visualized by standard x-ray can be identified as normal or abnormal organs or tissues (Sanders).
Ultrasound is a relatively new and exciting diagnostic tool used in medicine. The advances that have occurred and the ones on the horizon are filled with optimism. This imaging

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