CT of Non-Traumatic Body Emergencies

This book is divided into seven main chapters and 31 sections covering all body regions in adults. It begins with an introductory chapter on CT protocols for patients requiring imaging in the urgent/emergency setting. The discussion on scanning protocols, including contrast medium administration and optimising image acquisition and review, is well presented in this chapter.

The subsequent chapters systematically review the neck, chest, abdomen, pelvis and extremities. The chapters on chest pain and extrapulmonary air (chapters six and seven) are well written and illustrated with high quality images. Pulmonary embolism is included in the chapter on chest pain and a notable addition is the use of dual-energy CT (DECT) in its diagnosis.

I was particularly impressed with chapter eight on chest compartment syndrome, where the concepts of primary and secondary thoracic compression syndrome are well presented with evidence-based clinical information and high quality CT images for correlation.

The division of chapters for abdominal and pelvic imaging follows a logical order, where the clinical indications for CT in the emergency setting (chapter nine) precedes chapters covering areas such as intra-abdominal free air and bowel obstruction. Unfortunately, the table at the end of this chapter correlating suspected pathology, aetiology, clinical symptoms and major expected CT signs has an error in that bowel wall thickening rather than gallbladder wall thickening has been mentioned in the context of acute cholecystitis.

Chapter 10 on intra-abdominal free air is well written with excellent illustrations demonstrating the value of CT in localising the region of a gastric or bowel perforation.

Conditions such as acute appendicitis, diverticulitis and mesenteric ischaemia have their own chapters, which are well written and excellently illustrated. Chapter 12 on bowel obstruction would benefit from more consistent terminology such as ‘mechanical bowel obstruction’ rather than ‘mechanical and paralitic (sic) ileus’.

Emergencies in pregnancy, imaging of sepsis and imaging of vascular emergencies such as the painful and cold limb and the swollen limb are well written and richly illustrated.

The book references guidelines set by the American College of Radiology, which are largely similar to The Royal College of Radiologists guidelines in the UK. 

The quality of images throughout is excellent, with appropriate captions making it easy for the reader to understand the pathology of the condition at a glance. The last chapter on tips and tricks provides a good summary for the reporting radiologist, particularly if using a checklist for structured reporting. References to DECT are also provided where appropriate.

The book would certainly benefit from better proofreading to avoid inconsistencies and spelling mistakes. An index of terms at the end of the book would help the reader to search for the relevant information in a short time. Searching by terms is certainly easier in the PDF version.

To summarise, the print and PDF versions of this book are useful additions to the library of a busy radiology department. I am looking forward to a second edition of this book in the years to come, with better proofreading and an index of terms.

To purchase this title at our discounted rate email: katherine@radmagazine.com.