High-tech digital scanner spots tiny cancer lesions other scanners miss

HONOLULU, Hawaii (HawaiiNewsNow) - At InSight Imaging, a new state-of-the-art machine produces high-definition digital scans of the human body ― down to the smallest detail.

“The level of sharpness and clarity is far beyond anything we’ve ever seen before,” company President Max Clini said.

The Philips Vereos PET/CT unit is a $3 million cancer-detecting tool.

Nuclear medicine physician Dr. Lynn Madanay said now radiologists and physicians have a much clearer view of a patient's cancer.

"The higher sensitivity of the camera allows you to pick out smaller lesions," he said.

Those lesions may have gone unnoticed by analog scanners, so it can speed up cancer diagnosis and cut down on radiation exposure.

"The scan times historically on an older analog machine would take anywhere from 30 to 40 minutes. Nowadays we're able to cut that down to less than ten minutes," Clini said.

Radiologists say digital PET/CT scanning is quickly becoming the industry standard.

But InSight Imaging has the only Philips Vereos PET/CT scanner in Hawaii, and there are only 25 in the United States.

"There is no additional cost to the healthcare system or the patients. The reimbursement will remain the same as they were before and the patient co-pays will remain the same as well," Clini said.

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