Pulmonary angiography

Pulmonary angiography (or pulmonary arteriography) is a cardiologicalmedicalprocedure. Pulmonary blood vesselsare x-rayedto detect blood clots(such as a pulmonary embolism) or arteriovenous malformations.

Direct angiography is the injection of radiocontrastinto the circulation with subsequent fluoroscopy(direct X-ray visualisation) of the lungs. A more common form of direct angiography, which is regarded as the gold standardfor pulmonary embolism, is the catheterisation of the right atrium of the heart and injection of radiocontrast into the right heart.

A popular form of pulmonary angiography is computed tomographypulmonary angiography (CTPA). This involves venous contrast only, and has a high detection rate of pulmonary embolism.

See also

• Angiogram
• Lung

External link

• "Pulmonary angiography" @ MedlinePlus Medical Encyclopedia

This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.
It uses material from the http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulmonary+angiography Wikipedia article Pulmonary angiography.