Multi-head deep learning framework for pulmonary disease detection and severity scoring with modified progressive learning.

Chest X-rays (CXR) are the most commonly used imaging methodology in radiology to diagnose pulmonary diseases with close to 2 billion CXRs taken every year. The recent upsurge of COVID-19 and its variants accompanied by pneumonia and tuberculosis can be fatal in some cases and lives could be saved through early detection and appropriate intervention for the advanced cases. Thus CXRs can be used for an automated severity grading of pulmonary diseases that can aid radiologists in making better and informed diagnoses. In this article, we propose a single framework for disease classification and severity scoring produced by segmenting the lungs into six regions. We present a modified progressive learning technique in which the amount of augmentations at each step is capped. Our base network in the framework is first trained using modified progressive learning and can then be tweaked for new data sets. Furthermore, the segmentation task makes use of an attention map generated within and by the network itself. This attention mechanism allows to achieve segmentation results that are on par with networks having an order of magnitude or more parameters. We also propose severity score grading for 4 thoracic diseases that can provide a single-digit score corresponding to the spread of opacity in different lung segments with the help of radiologists. The proposed framework is evaluated using the BRAX data set for segmentation and classification into six classes with severity grading for a subset of the classes. On the BRAX validation data set, we achieve F1 scores of 0.924 and 0.939 without and with fine-tuning, respectively. A mean matching score of 80.8% is obtained for severity score grading while an average area under receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.88 is achieved for classification.

Attention based automated radiology report generation using CNN and LSTM.

The automated generation of radiology reports provides X-rays and has tremendous potential to enhance the clinical diagnosis of diseases in patients. A new research direction is gaining increasing attention that involves the use of hybrid approaches based on natural language processing and computer vision techniques to create auto medical report generation systems. The auto report generator, producing radiology reports, will significantly reduce the burden on doctors and assist them in writing manual reports. Because the sensitivity of chest X-ray (CXR) findings provided by existing techniques not adequately accurate, producing comprehensive explanations for medical photographs remains a difficult task. A novel approach to address this issue was proposed, based on the continuous integration of convolutional neural networks and long short-term memory for detecting diseases, followed by the attention mechanism for sequence generation based on these diseases. Experimental results obtained by using the Indiana University CXR and MIMIC-CXR datasets showed that the proposed model attained the current state-of-the-art efficiency as opposed to other solutions of the baseline. BLEU-1, BLEU-2, BLEU-3, and BLEU-4 were used as the evaluation metrics.

COVID-19 vaccine acceptance and hesitancy in low- and middle-income countries.

Widespread acceptance of COVID-19 vaccines is crucial for achieving sufficient immunization coverage to end the global pandemic, yet few studies have investigated COVID-19 vaccination attitudes in lower-income countries, where large-scale vaccination is just beginning. We analyze COVID-19 vaccine acceptance across 15 survey samples covering 10 low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) in Asia, Africa and South America, Russia (an upper-middle-income country) and the United States, including a total of 44,260 individuals. We find considerably higher willingness to take a COVID-19 vaccine in our LMIC samples (mean 80.3%; median 78%; range 30.1 percentage points) compared with the United States (mean 64.6%) and Russia (mean 30.4%). Vaccine acceptance in LMICs is primarily explained by an interest in personal protection against COVID-19, while concern about side effects is the most common reason for hesitancy. Health workers are the most trusted sources of guidance about COVID-19 vaccines. Evidence from this sample of LMICs suggests that prioritizing vaccine distribution to the Global South should yield high returns in advancing global immunization coverage. Vaccination campaigns should focus on translating the high levels of stated acceptance into actual uptake. Messages highlighting vaccine efficacy and safety, delivered by healthcare workers, could be effective for addressing any remaining hesitancy in the analyzed LMICs.

Gated MIBI myocardial SPECT showing balanced ischemia and global hypokinesia in patient having thrombus in basal segment of dominant circumflex system blocking both left anterior descending and circumflex artery.

Myocardial perfusion imaging (MPI) is a powerful diagnostic and prognostic tool for evaluating coronary artery disease (CAD). Gating myocardial perfusion gives important diagnostic and prognostic information. This 43 years old patient was referred for cardiac scan. Exercise stress test showed > 2 mm horizontal ST segment depression. Cardiac scan was normal except for left ventricular cavity dilatation on stress images. Gated images showed global hypokinesia and increased end-diastolic volume. Patient was suspected to have balanced ischemia and was referred for Angiography. Angiography showed total occlusion with no flow in proximal Left Anterior Descending Artery and distal circumflex artery. It is very important to evaluate symptomatic patients and patients with risk factors carefully with normal myocardial perfusion scan.

Transabdominal Ultrasound: A Potentially Accurate And Useful Tool For Detection Of Choledocholithiasis.

BACKGROUND: Choledocholithiasis denotes to the presence of gallstones within the common bile duct. In patients with Gall stones, the precise incidence and prevalence of choledocholithiasis are not known, but it has been estimated that 5-20 percent of patients have choledocholithiasis at the time of cholecystectomy, with the incidence increasing with age. The transabdominal ultrasound examination (US) is the most commonly used modality for symptoms attributable to gallstone disease. US can provide important evidence for presence of stones in CBD. METHODS: This was a descriptive cross-sectional validation study which was conducted at PAEC General Hospital, Islamabad from February to July 2015. Patients with suspected choledocholithiasis attending radiology department for ultrasound abdomen were included in the study. Findings for dilatation of common bile duct, intrahepatic biliary channel dilatation and direct visualization of calculus in CBD were noted. Ultrasound findings were compared with subsequent ERCP which was considered gold standard. RESULTS: Diagnostic accuracy of trans abdominal ultrasound in detection of choledocholithiasis came out to be 76.9% with sensitivity of 76.2% and specificity of 81.3%. CONCLUSIONS: Ultrasound can be used as an initial and baseline tool for detection of CBD calculi as it is non-invasive, easily available, radiation free and cost effective.

Dual phase MIBI scintigraphy in diagnosis of parathyroid adenoma followed by ultrasound guided percutaneous alcoholic ablation.

Primary Hyperparathyroidism (HPT) is an inappropriate hyper secretion of parathyroid hormone (PTH). Primary HPT is caused by parathyroid adenoma in 80-85% of patients. Clinical manifestations are kidney stones, abdominal groans, painful bones, psychic moans, and fatigue overtones. Ultrasonography is widely used in suspected cases for localization of parathyroid adenoma. There is considerable intra-observer variation and it is difficult for ultrasound alone to differentiate parathyroid lesion form that of thyroid. Dual phase Tc-99m MIBI scinitigraphy for detection of parathyroid adenomas has sensitivity and specificity values ranging from 82% to 100% and from 89% to 100%, respectively. Percutaneous ethanol injection for parathyroid glands can be applied effectively in selected cases when surgery is unadvisable either for technical reasons (e.g., recurrence ofhyperplastic glands in the neck after subtotal surgery or intrathyroideal parathyroid tumors or the poor clinical state of the patient.

Gastric Emptying Scintigraphy In Assessment Of Chronic Vomiting.

Gastroparesis being multifocal abnormality is characterized by objective feeling of prolong time of gastric retention without any evidence of anatomical blockage. The key symptoms include early satiety, feeling of fullness after meals, nausea, vomiting, bloating, and upper abdominal pain. Radio isotopic Gastric emptying study using radiolabelled test food is integrated clinically for evaluation of functional gastric motility disorders. We present a young female having abdominal pain and vomiting for two months. She was investigated for anatomical causes and no abnormality was uncovered. Gastric Emptying scintigraphy revealed delayed lag phase and half gastric emptying time consistent with the diagnosis of Gastroparesis.