The Department of Radiology continues to expand in areas of clinical service, education, and research. New facilities, new programs, and new faculty abound. The Department is in the middle of the most aggressive expansion of imaging facilities ever at the University of Chicago, and of a magnitude rarely encountered nationwide.

The opening of the new Comer Children’s Hospital on the University of Chicago campus in February of 2005 represented a large expansion of pediatric radiology services. Confirming the key role imaging plays in guiding care for children, an extensive new radiology facility opened there including new CT scanner, a 1.5T MR scanner, digital radiology and fluoroscopy, and 2 new ultrasound suites. The digital reading rooms with conference capabilities within the reading room ensure that this will be a focal point for patient care and radiology education.

The renovation of the Mitchell Hospital Department has completed phase 1. New spacious, subspecialty reading rooms to service Chest, Neuroradiology, Abdominal Imaging, Vascular/Interventional and Musculoskeletal Imaging was the key component for this renovation. These rooms were created for all digital reading of clinical cases with each room having large screen systems on-line for continual interactive education among radiology faculty and residents, technical staff, and referring colleagues. These reading rooms abut the renovated CT technical work area, ultrasound work area, and interventional suites making continual interactions occur effectively and optimal clinical and educational outcomes. The renovations in the CT work area have been completed, including the installations over the past two years of 40 and 64 slice CT scanners. The 64 slice scanner was the first beta unit placed in North America or Europe by Philips, and is an example of the strong working relationship the department maintains with industry. The renovations in phase 1 also included new facilities for the residents with a new call room, resident office and locker room.

Phase 2 renovation has been started and is expected to be completed early in 2006 with the addition of a new 12 bed nursing/holding unit for radiology procedures, 2 new angiography suites (including bi-plane flat panel digital capability), and 2 new ultrasound units. The combining of the outpatient and inpatient ultrasound in Mitchell Hospital will consolidate all abdominal CT, MR, and US to be read in one reading room, with all attendings and residents in one location for reading and education.

Phase 3 renovation for Mitchell Hospital will begin after completion of phase 2, with the installation planned for 2 new MR units (3T and 1.5T), which will be placed near the emergency room allowing for more optimal emergency MR services. The 3.0T research MR will remain on the third floor of the Goldblatt pavilion for research, and the current 1.5T unit being used for inpatients will be converted to a research scanner as well. With the additional new MR unit in Comer Children’s Hospital there has been a large increase in MR capacity with new state-of-the-art equipment.

Several new programs were expanded substantially or started during the past year. With the recruitment of Dr. Brian Roman, the Department outfitted and opened a new molecular imaging laboratory. Initially focusing on pancreatic endocrine function and cardiac muscle function, the expertise and equipment here will allow the department to move into other areas of investigation as well. Through the support of the University of Chicago Cancer Research Center a new program in optical imaging has been created with functioning equipment now in place. The existing research programs through the many arms of the Department continue to thrive in both clinical and basic science research, continuing to place the University of Chicago Radiology Department in the upper echelon of funded research sites.

The radiology residency was recently approved by the RRC to increase the size to 28 residents. The Ph.D. program in medical physics supported by the Department of Radiology and Radiation Oncology has increased in size to 30 Ph.D. candidates, the largest size the program has had. The energy, interest, and enthusiasm of all these trainees keeps the program very vibrant!

Our outpatient imaging center in the first floor of the Duchossois Center for Advanced Medicine (DCAM) currently is the home to two Phillips 16 slice CT scanners, three 1.5T MR scanners (including a planned upgrade to a new 1.5T Phillips Achieva platform), three fluoroscopy rooms for GI procedures, two ultrasound rooms, screening mammography and general radiology. On the second floor our breast imaging section provides extensive diagnostic breast imaging with digital mammography units and 2 Phillips ultrasound unites. Pediatric radiology has outpatient radiography, fluoroscopy, and ultrasound on the third floor of the DCAM, A musculoskeletal radiology reading room is on the fourth floor of the DCAM in the outpatient orthopedic radiology area.

Richard Baron, M.D. Professor of Radiology
Chairman, Department of Radiology The University of Chicago

Hospitals
http://www.uchospitals.edu/
The Hospitals comprise a tertiary academic medical center with 890 licensed beds including pediatric and neonatal beds, that covers all aspects of contemporary medicine including all medical and surgical specialties with special strengths in organ transplantation, oncology, gastroenterology, and musculoskeletal tumors. Within the last two decades, the Hospitals stayed at the forefront of medicine by adding the Brain Research Pavilion, the Aeromedical Network and the Duchossois Center for Advanced Medicine. Currently affiliated with the Hospitals are 11 Nobel Prize winners in Medicine or Physiology. The University of Chicago Hospitals opened the Duchossois Center for Advanced Medicine is a six-story center with a floor area of over 500,00 square feet and houses the new Radiology Department. Approximately 30,000 square feet and 30 rooms in this advanced facility are dedicated to Radiology and offer the full array of diagnostic services to the adult and pediatric patient. The Department of Radiology provides a full range of services at this outpatient center. Digital electronic imaging is available in many of the areas within the building, allowing physicians easier access to radiologic images.

Hyde Park
The University of Chicago Hospitals is located on the campus of the University of Chicago in Hyde Park, a unique historic neighborhood offering a small town academic environment less than five minutes from downtown Chicago. Many residents choose to live in Hyde Park and walk to work. There are a variety of other housing options within a short commute form the hospitals. We suggest that you visit www.uchicago.edu and http://magazine.uchicago.edu/ for more information about life on and around campus. You can keep up with local events through the Hyde Park Herald at www.hpherald.com.