The COVID-19 pandemic is causing a major outbreak in more than 150 countries around the world. It has severely impacted the health and life of many people globally.
One of the crucial steps in fighting COVID-19 is the ability to detect the infected patients early enough, and put them under special care, considering the uncertainty and the high infectious rate surrounding the virus.
Detecting Covid-19 from radiography and radiology images is perhaps one of the fastest ways to diagnose the patients.
One such progress in this regard has been made by researchers who found that chest C-rays could potentially help in rapid diagnosis of Covid-19.
Radiologists at the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center (LSU Health) New Orleans conducted a retrospective study of nearly 400 persons under investigation for Covid-19 in New Orleans. They reviewed the patients’ chest X-rays along with concurrent RT-PCR virus tests.
Using Covid-19 imaging patterns, they categorised each chest X-ray as characteristic, nonspecific, or negative in appearance for Covid-19.
The radiologists found a characteristic chest X-ray appearance which is highly specific with 96.6 percent and has a high positive predictive value of 83.3 percent for SARS-CoV-2 infection in the setting of pandemic.
Hence, the study reveals that there could be a potential link between chest X Rays and whether they predict the presence of infection.