A secondary analysis of patients with calcium scores of 600 or greater confirmed that pretest probability for coronary artery disease (CAD) and coronary calcium scoring are important factors in the effectiveness of CT angiography (CTA) to exclude or confirm the presence of obstructive CAD, according to a study published online Jan. 17 in Journal of the American College of Cardiology. The results showed that CTA should not be extended to patients with substantial coronary calcification, according to an accompanying editorial comment.

The Society of Nuclear Medicine (SNM) has announced the recipients of the 2011-2013 SNM Wagner-Torizuka Fellowship, which is a two-year fellowship designed to provide extensive training and experience in the fields of nuclear medicine and molecular imaging for Japanese physicians in the early stages of their careers.

In clinical cardiac Rubidium-82 PET studies, globally impaired flow reserve is a relevant marker for predicting short-term cardiovascular events, and it may be used for integration with currently established functional and morphologic test results and for guidance of preventive measures, especially in the absence of regional flow-limiting disease, according to a study in the May issue of the Journal of Nuclear Medicine.

FDG-PET is highly accurate in diagnosing progressive neurodegenerative disease such as Alzheimer’s disease (AD) even if cognitive dysfunction is only mild. Thus, novel brain imaging probes targeting, for instance, beta-amyloid will likely serve a different purpose. They will play an important role if beta-amyloid is confirmed as a molecular target of effective therapy, and drugs that target beta-amyloid are actually developed.