A picture of health

The impact on imaging in medicine (radiology) has also been transformative. For childhood tumours, techniques like MRI and CT – introduced in the 1970s and 80s – are now vital for both diagnosing the cancer and identifying its exact parameters. This is particularly important for planning surgical removal of brain tumours, where a mere millimetre error could mean damaging healthy brain tissue.

Professor Chris Clark and his neuroimaging team at GOSH are now using advanced MRI techniques, including diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and tractography, to visualise vital nerve pathways and map out connections between different parts of the brain. This helps surgeons to plan even more precise procedures. GOSH hopes to open an incredible new intra-operative MRI suite, which allows imaging of a child’s brain during an operation. Brain structures can shift slightly during surgery, so the technique should further improve the chances of removing all cancerous tissue.

Radiologists can now see the shape, position and shadows of organs and tumours, as well as chemical reactions inside individual cells, too. Known as nuclear medicine, the approach uses a special camera to track drugs as they pass through the body and show whether cells are responding to treatment for conditions like leukemia. If they’re not, doctors can rapidly begin a different regime. GOSH has ambitious plans to install the most sophisticated of these scanners, known as a PET-MR, as part of the next phase of its rebuilding programme.

Today

2015 A 3T MRI scanner was installed in Turtle ward, giving surgeons the optimum information for their decision-making. The future The Khoo Teck Puat iMRI Suite, an incredible new intra-operative MRI suite will allow imaging of a child’s brain during an operation, which should further improve the chances of removing all cancerous tissue.

Image of a 3T MRI Prisma scanner at GOSH.