Department of Aerospace Medicine, Fourth Military Medical University, Xi'an, China.
Medical Engineering Section, General Hospital of Shenyang Military Region, Shenyang, China.
Biomed Res Int. 2020 Feb 27;2020:1357160. doi: 10.1155/2020/1357160. eCollection 2020.
Hemothorax is a serious medical condition that can be life-threatening if left untreated. Early diagnosis and timely treatment are of great importance to produce favorable outcome. Although currently available diagnostic techniques, e.g., chest radiography, ultrasonography, and CT, can accurately detect hemothorax, delayed hemothorax cannot be identified early because these examinations are often performed on patients until noticeable symptoms manifest. Therefore, for early detection of delayed hemothorax, real-time monitoring by means of a portable and noninvasive imaging technique is needed. In this study, we employed electrical impedance tomography (EIT) to detect the onset of hemothorax in real time on eight piglet hemothorax models. The models were established by injection of 60 ml fresh autologous blood into the pleural cavity, and the subsequent development of hemothorax was monitored continuously. The results showed that EIT was able to sensitively detect hemothorax as small as 10 ml in volume, as well as its location. Also, the development of hemothorax over a range of 10 ml up to 60 ml was well monitored in real time, with a favorable linear relationship between the impedance change in EIT images and the volume of blood injected. These findings demonstrated that EIT has a unique potential for early diagnosis and continuous monitoring of hemothorax in clinical practice, providing medical staff valuable information for prompt identification and treatment of delayed hemothorax.
血胸是一种严重的医疗状况，如果不及时治疗可能会危及生命。早期诊断和及时治疗对于获得良好的结果非常重要。尽管目前的诊断技术，如胸部 X 射线、超声和 CT，能够准确地检测出血胸，但由于这些检查通常在出现明显症状时才对患者进行，因此无法早期发现延迟性血胸。因此，需要一种便携式、非侵入性的成像技术来实时监测，以早期发现延迟性血胸。在这项研究中，我们使用电阻抗断层成像（EIT）实时检测 8 个小猪血胸模型中的血胸发作。通过向胸腔内注射 60ml 新鲜自体血来建立模型，并持续监测血胸的发展。结果表明，EIT 能够灵敏地检测到小至 10ml 的血胸，以及其位置。此外，EIT 图像中的阻抗变化与注入的血量之间存在良好的线性关系，能够实时监测从 10ml 到 60ml 范围内血胸的发展情况。这些发现表明，EIT 具有独特的潜力，可用于临床实践中血胸的早期诊断和连续监测，为医务人员提供有价值的信息，以便及时识别和治疗延迟性血胸。
