CT Traumatic Injuries - Video Lesson

Hey everybody, welcome back. This lesson is about common traumatic injuries of the extremities that we evaluate using CT imaging. We'll start with fractures. Plane radiography is usually all that's necessary when evaluating fractures of the extremities, but sometimes CT is helpful. CT imaging is used to evaluate fractures of the extremities when radiographs are inconclusive or when a detailed assessment of complex fractures is required for surgical planning. In this case, the patient has a fracture through the radial head. Plane radiography may be able to identify a fracture like this, but CT is much better. CT is especially helpful when imaging intra articular fractures like this because CT shows us how the fracture is affecting the stability of the joint. The same fracture is visible in the axial plane. This axial image confirms that this is a simple, linear, non displaced fracture through the radial head. The fracture is stable and the alignment of the elbow joint is preserved.