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Increasingly, computed tomographic angiography (CTA) is used as a stand-alone test for diagnosing pulmonary embolism. Some authorities have advocated addition of venous-phase CT venography (CTV), in which pelvic and thigh veins are imaged after the pulmonary arteries. With CTA-CTV, screening can be accomplished for both deep-vein thrombosis and pulmonary embolism during the same examination.
In the Prospective Investigation Of Pulmonary Embolism Diagnosis II (PIOPED II), researchers performed multidetector CTA-CTV in 824 patients (mostly outpatients) with suspected pulmonary embolism. According to a complex reference standard (involving ventilation-perfusion scanning, conventional pulmonary angiography, leg ultrasound, and the Wells score to…