The American Society of Neuroradiology. Neuroradiology research: the opportunities and the challenges.

The next decade will witness an explosion of research and development in the neurosciences. The imaging of physiologic and functional processes--the frontier today--will become the norm. There are huge populations of patients with neurodegenerative and cerebrovascular diseases that require nonanatomic diagnostic evaluation. Radiologists must cease being just readers of morphologic images. They must broaden their scope and their areas of expertise. Imaging-guided therapy of all forms will alter the types of interventions we perform on patients. These new techniques will increase the efficacy of neuro-interventions while decreasing their morbidity and mortality. Resources, both human and financial, will be conserved. Radiologists can participate in this wonderful future if they broaden their training. Information management and the use of imaging for procedural guidance are the bases of our profession, but we are weak in the clinical applications of the technology. We must realize that our clinical colleagues are poised to assume the leadership in imaging research and development and in its performance. The challenge to the leaders of radiology is quite apparent: the recognition of the need to train for the future with the most open of minds and the least rigidity. This requires that we all understand the depth of the merger between the imaging and the clinical sciences that is occurring and that will increase substantially in the future. We must be the leaders in such a merger; otherwise, we will not be participants.