The Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) recently published a study titled ‘Chest CT findings in coronavirus disease-19 (COVID-19): Relationship to duration of infection’. The study highlights the early investigations on chest radiography and computed tomography (CT) scans of patients in the early weeks of the new Coronavirus outbreak. Read a summary of the analysis and key findings of the study here.
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Researchers Bernheim A, Mei X, Huang M, Yang Y, Fayad ZA, Zhang N, et al. in their study review chest CT findings of 121 COVID-19 patients to identify the relationship to the time between symptom onset and stages during the infection. The objective was to understand the pathogenesis of COVID-19 infection while it progresses (to stages as defined in the study) in the bodies of infected patients, and identify its typical features for enabling early detection.
Key points
- When the time after the onset of symptoms was longer, CT findings became more frequent
- The typical signs of COVID-19 on imaging were bilateral and peripheral ground-glass and consolidative pulmonary opacities
- CT findings also showed consolidation, bilateral and peripheral disease, greater total lung involvement, linear opacities, a ‘crazy-paving’ pattern and a ‘reverse halo’ sign
- Bilateral lung involvement was observed in 28% of early patients, 76% intermediate patients, and 88% late patients
