Things to note when lung cancer patients undergo CT examination

Lung cancer patients can undergo CT examinations and pay attention to the following matters:

1. Before CT examination, a chest X-ray examination should be performed first. Those who need enhanced scanning should first undergo an iodine allergy test. Before scanning, explain the precautions to the patient to obtain the patient's cooperation with the examination. For plain scanning, routine chest CT scanning is performed in the supine position. In some cases, prone position, left and right oblique position and lateral position can be supplemented according to the condition. First, take a chest positioning image to determine the scanning range. During the scan, ask the patient to hold his breath. The routine scanning layer thickness is 8mm or 10mm, and the scanning is continuous. Thin layer scanning can be added according to the needs of the lesion. It is mainly used for isolated small lesions in the lungs, bronchiectasis and diffuse interstitial lesions in the lungs.

2. The lung base is adjacent to the adrenal glands, which are common metastatic sites of lung cancer. Therefore, during chest CT scans of lung cancer, it is recommended to routinely scan several layers including the adrenal glands. This can reduce the waste of medical resources. In addition to lung and kidney examinations, CT scans of the brain, liver, and adrenal glands are also required. The main purpose is to rule out distant metastasis of lung cancer.

3. For patients with a clinical diagnosis of a superior pulmonary sulcus tumor, an MRI examination of the spine and thoracic inlet is recommended to understand the anatomical relationship between the subosteal artery and vertebral artery and the tumor. For mediastinal lymph nodes with a minimum diameter greater than 1 cm, a transcervical mediastinoscopy is recommended. The size of the mediastinal lymph nodes is still the main method of CT diagnosis to determine whether the lymph nodes have metastasized. A large number of studies have found that the false positive rate of CT in determining whether the mediastinal lymph nodes have metastasized is 40%.