Depending on the type of shoulder injury you've sustained, your physician may recommend MRI, an X-ray or a CT scan. A CT (computed topography) scan is a type of diagnostic imaging that uses X-rays to create cross-sectional pictures of various parts of the body.
“Shoulder injuries are very common in many sports,” says Audrey Spielmann, a radiologist and HealthChoicesFirst.com partner. “We often see it during direct impact, and if athletes have fallen, they can sustain shoulder dislocation and fracture. So we see that in hockey players, skiers and other contact sports such as football and soccer as well as rugby.”
How a CT Scan Detects Shoulder Injuries
“The CT scan highlights the bone issues with shoulder injuries, so the advantage of CT, especially these days where the technology is improved, is that we can image the shoulder with such thin slices and then do 3D reconstructions,” says Spielmann. “CT allows us to do very thin cuts through the bone and then reconstruct the image in multiple different planes as well as do a 3D reconstruction.
Benefits of Shoulder CT Scans
“The benefit of CT scan is the detail is much greater than with plain X-ray, and we can identify very subtle fractures with CT and do the reconstructions to determine the full extent of it,” says Spielmann.
Shoulder CT scans can be very complementary to shoulder MRI, and both are often performed to investigate sports injuries.
“The CT scan looks for the bony component, and the MRI looks for the soft tissue component,” says Spielmann.
If you have any questions on shoulder CT scans, contact your family doctor, your sports medicine specialist or local diagnostic imaging center.
Complementary Content to Shoulder CT Scans for Shoulder Injuries
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If you've injured your shoulder or any other part of your body, massage therapy can be a great way to rehabilitate the injury. Whether you've recently injured your shoulder or have been dealing with a chronic injury for years, massage therapy can help loosen muscles and promote healing. Learn about the various options of massage therapy available to you: watch massage therapy videos.