(Vienna, 02 December 2016) Rüdiger Schernthaner, a radiologist at MedUni Vienna, was awarded the Dr. Franz Holeczke Prize at the annual conference of the Austrian Society for Radiation Protection in Medicine (VMSÖ).
The Austrian Society for Radiation Protection in Medicine (VMSÖ) awards the Dr. Franz Holeczke Prize to young investigators who have distinguished themselves by their outstanding scientific achievements in the field of radiation protection in medicine. Rüdiger Schernthaner was awarded the prize for the publication "A new angiographic imaging platform reduces radiation exposure for patients with liver cancer treated with transarterial chemoembolization", published in the leading journal "European Radiology".
This study evaluated the radiation exposure and image quality associated with a new C-arm unit during transarterial chemoembolization (TACE) in 52 patients with primary and secondary liver cancer. The parameters obtained were directly compared with those of the previous system, which was used to treat a further 26 patients by means of TACE.
The new system uses optimised acquisition parameters to reduce radiation exposure, as well as newly developed real-time image processing software to compensate for the loss of image quality. The researchers were able to show that the new system allows radiation exposure to be reduced significantly, especially during digital subtraction angiography (-80%) but also during fluoroscopy (-50%). The researchers were able to reduce the radiation exposure of the patients by two thirds, whilst maintaining the same image quality. Although the study did not analyse the radiation exposure of the operating team, it is safe to assume that their radiation exposure would also be considerably reduced.
About Rüdiger Schernthaner
Rüdiger Schernthaner studied medicine in Vienna from 1998 to 2003. From 2004 – 2007 he worked as a scientific assistant at the Department of Biomedical Imaging and Image-guided Therapy, where he completed his specialist training between 2007 and 2012. During this training he was the trainee doctors' representative at the Austrian Radiological Society (ÖRG) and the Austrian delegate to the Radiology Trainee Forum of the European Society of Radiology (ESR). On completion of his specialist training, he received a Max Kade bursary for a 19-month research fellowship in interventional oncology at the prestigious Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore (USA). Since then, he has been working as a senior doctor in the Division of Cardiovascular and Interventional Radiology, where he has built up his own research group focusing on cardiovascular imaging and interventional oncology. He submitted his postdoctoral thesis in radiology at the end of 2015.
So far, Rüdiger Schernthaner has 51 published scientific articles to his name and wrote the chapter on "Management of Peripheral Arterial Disease" in the book entitled "Managing Cardiovascular Complications in Diabetes". He is a member of several specialist societies and is a reviewer for various journals, including European Radiology, Cardiovascular and Interventional Radiology and the European Journal of Radiology. Link: Researcher Profile
Service: European Radiology
Schernthaner RE, Duran R, Chapiro J, Wang Z, Geschwind JF, Lin M. A new angiographic imaging platform reduces radiation exposure for patients with liver cancer treated with transarterial chemoembolization. Eur Radiol. 2015;25(11):3255-62.