Medical Imaging

Medical Imaging

Medical imaging encompasses the technique and process utilized to generate images of the human body or its functions for clinical purposes, such as diagnosis, examination, or medical research focusing on normal anatomy and physiology. Although imaging of removed organs and tissues can serve medical purposes, these procedures are typically categorized under pathology rather than medical imaging.

In its broadest sense, medical imaging is part of biological imaging and encompasses disciplines such as radiology, nuclear medicine, investigative radiological sciences, endoscopy, medical thermography, medical photography, and microscopy for human pathological investigations.

Measurement and recording techniques not primarily intended to produce images, such as electroencephalography (EEG), magnetoencephalography (MEG), and electrocardiography (EKG), but which yield data that can be represented as positional maps, are also considered forms of medical imaging.

Medical imaging is commonly associated with techniques that noninvasively produce images of the body's internal structures. In this context, medical imaging is regarded as the solution to mathematical inverse problems, where the properties of living tissue are deduced from observed signals. For instance, ultrasonography employs ultrasonic pressure waves, while projection radiography utilizes X-ray radiation absorbed at varying rates by different tissue types like bone, muscle, and fat.

The term "noninvasive" refers to modalities that do not physically penetrate the skin, although they may be considered invasive at electromagnetic and radiation levels. Technologies such as X-Ray Computed Tomography and MRI utilize high-energy photons and magnetic fields, respectively, altering the body's physical and chemical environment to acquire data.

Various types of medical imaging technologies include:

- Medical radiography
- Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)
- Fiduciary markers
- Nuclear medicine
- Photoacoustic imaging
- Breast thermography
- Tomography
- Ultrasound