A comparison between ultrasound and plain X-ray imaging for detecting and locating penetrating foreign bodies.

Abstract

The main aim of the study was to compare ultrasonography and plain X-ray imaging in their ability to detect and locate penetrating soft tissue foreign bodies. The researcher aimed to find out which of the two imaging modalities should be used to detect and locate foreign bodies made of metal, glass, wood and plastic. The researcher wanted to test how the composition of the foreign bodies affected the ability of X-ray imaging and ultrasonography to detect them. This is a correlation study. The researcher performed tests on phantoms containing foreign bodies composed of metal, glass, wood and plastic. The tests involved imaging with X-ray and Ultrasonography. The results of the tests were listed in a table to allow easier comparison. The results of the study show that ultrasonography detected 100% of the foreign bodies. The sonographer was able to detect all the metal, glass, wood and plastic foreign bodies using a high frequency ultrasound machine. The results also show that X-ray imaging detected 85.7% of the foreign bodies. The foreign bodies that were not detected were composed of wood and plastic. The researcher concluded that ultrasonography is more useful for the detection of penetrating soft tissue foreign bodies than X-ray imaging.