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I wonder why ambulances don't have mobile x-ray systems? I realize the radiation would have to be managed, but it seems like a great application of technology to perform the imaging and send it digitally while eh route.

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There aren't many cases where having an X-ray done a little faster would be massively helpful. Emergency department physicians and trauma surgeons can read an X-ray for acute trauma in a matter of seconds, and doing the X-ray itself doesn't take more than a few seconds either. It's hard to think of a pathology that would show up on X-ray but not through the patient's presentation or physical exam. Going off memory, I can't think of a situation where an X-ray would be the crossroads that determines what I do next for the patient. Also, an X-ray done in a moving ambulance is probably going to be of fairly low quality. In most cases, they'd just have to redo it in the hospital.

The mobile CT scanner is also not super helpful for much other than determining whether a potential stroke patient has a grossly hemorrhagic stroke. In that one case, it is beneficial, but I don't think mobile CT scanners are used for much else.

To elaborate why a CT scanner is really really important in this case - there are two general kinds of strokes. Ischemic strokes are caused by a blood clot occluding an artery, preventing blood from reaching part of the brain. On the other hand, hemorrhagic strokes are caused by bleeding within the brain. We can use thrombolytic drugs (e.g. TPA) to break up a clot in an ischemic stroke. However, impairing clotting in a hemorrhagic stroke just makes it bleed faster.

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