New expert consensus provides update to cardiac CT medical terminology

ARLINGTON, VA – The Society of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography (SCCT) released an expert consensus document standardizing medical terminology commonly used in clinical and research activities related to cardiac computed tomography (CT), providing an update to guidance published 12 years ago by the society in the Journal of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography (JCCT).

“Standardized Medical Terminology for Cardiac Computed Tomography 2023 Update” is co-authored, co-published or endorsed by eight national and international societies across cardiac imaging modalities. It offers expert consensus on vocabulary commonly used for all aspects of cardiac CT, including acquisition protocol and post-processing analysis. The multi-society update stems from terminology previously unified by a consensus agreement of cardiologists, medical physicists and radiologists, originally published in 2011.

“This is an update to the prior dated document with modernized terminology for evolving technology, including new photon counting computed tomographic machines,” said writing group co-chair and corresponding author Lynne Koweek, MD, FACR, FSCCT. “Standardized terminology allows for consistency in communication across all members of the imaging community and will assist with clinical care and multicenter trials.”

The document was created to consolidate regularly used abbreviations and terms, as well as provide clear definitions for terms applicable to cardiac CT, a field involving a wide span of contributor types that “continues to expand with increasing applications and evolving technology," according to the writing group, led by co-chairs Koweek, Suhny Abbara, MD, FACR, MSCCT and Marcus Y. Chen, MD.

Additions for version 2.0 include expanding CT technology and radiology lexicon standard terminology. The authors placed emphasis on updating prior terminology to contemporary technology, expanding uses of cardiac CT and CT angiography (CTA), and consistency with the RADLEX terminology.

The update takes a multimodality approach, with contributions from five co-authoring societies – SCCT, American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM), American College of Radiology (ACR), North American Society for Cardiovascular Imaging (NASCI) and Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) – and three endorsing societies: the Asian Society of Cardiovascular Imaging (ASCI), European Association of Cardiovascular Imaging (EACVI) and The European Society of Cardiovascular Radiology (ESCR).

The document will be co-published in Radiology: Cardiothoracic Imaging, a journal of RSNA.

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About the Society of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography

Founded in 2005, the Society of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography (SCCT) is the international professional society devoted to improving health outcomes through effective use of cardiovascular computed tomography (CCT). SCCT is a community of physicians, scientists and technologists from over 85 countries advocating for access, research, education and clinical excellence in the use of CCT. For more information, please visit www.SCCT.org.

About the Journal of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography

The Journal of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography (JCCT) is a peer-review journal of the SCCT that integrates the international cardiovascular CT community and addresses a broad range of topics affecting cardiovascular CT imaging. The journal’s major focus is on original research and on the clinical and technical aspects of cardiovascular CT. For more information, please visit www.journalofcardiovascularct.com.

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