Bedside exam may be superior to CT in detecting post-brain surgery complications.

Moral of the story: CT is shown yet again to be less effective than originally thought, but will likely to continue to be gold standard because of litigation and societal desire for technology

Source: AMA Morning Rounds 12/29/09

Bedside exam may be superior to CT in detecting post-brain surgery complications.

HealthDay (12/28, Dotinga) reported that, according to a study appearing online in the Journal of Neurosurgery, "the low-cost, simple, but elegant neurological exam appears to be superior to a routine CT scan in determining return to the operating room" due to "post-brain surgery complications." A review of "the medical records of 251 patients who underwent CT scans within 24 hours of surgery" revealed that "the scans failed to show who would need to go back to the operating room." But, bedside exams showed "serious problems in 10 cases that required urgent CT scans; three of the patients needed to go back to the operating room."