RSNA Spotlight Course Highlights Cancer Imaging

The innovations in oncology that are changing the way radiologists diagnose cancer were highlights of the recent RSNA Spotlight Course, Tendências e perspectivas em radiologia oncológica: abordagem multidisciplinary, which drew 115 attendees, including a mix of radiologists, surgeons, oncologists and pathologists.

The Spotlight Course included didactic lectures and case-based sessions focusing on chest, musculoskeletal, gastrointestinal and genitourinaryoncologic imaging. In addition to sessions on new imaging techniques in oncology, the course included discussions around precision medicine, artificial intelligence and genomics. Several sessions featured Diagnosis Live™, the popular RSNA gamification software that allowed participants to test their knowledge in real time.

Course directors Martin P. Torriani, MD, director of metabolic imaging core and musculoskeletal ultrasound at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, and Roberto Blasbalg, MD, PhD, head of internal medicine at Diagnosticos da America SA (DASA) Group in São Paulo and a researcher at Cancer Institute of São Paulo (ICESP), led the two-day program.

Dr. Blasbalg summed up the courses and sessions featured over the two days.

“We learned from an oncologist from São Paulo who talked about precision medicine and followed up with a discussion about opportunities for radiologists in precision medicine. Day one also included talks about new treatments in cancer like immunotherapies and artificial intelligence and the radiologist’s role in this new world,” Dr. Blasbalg said. “On the second day, we took a practical approach using RSNA’s Diagnosis Live and dividing groups into chest, genitourinary, gastrointestinal and musculoskeletal categories with a lot of participation from the audience.”

Dr. Torriani shared his thoughts on how this course was particularly helpful for musculoskeletal radiologists. 

“The advent of new anti-cancer agents and molecular targeted drugs has the potential to improve the prognosis of patients with primary bone tumors and skeletal metastases. For this reason, musculoskeletal oncologic imaging will require standardization and adoption of advanced functional characterization, to allow consistency in follow-up and better understanding of treatment response,” Dr. Torriani said. “Attendees at the course took home a better understanding of approaches and controversies in bone and soft tissue tumor biopsies and a familiarity with the histopathologic basis for the imaging appearance of musculoskeletal tumors.”

Spotlight Courses are planned for 2020 and 2021 in locations around the world. 

For more Information

Register to be notified about upcoming Spotlight Courses at RSNA.org/Spotlight.