What Is Virtual Imaging, Inc.?
Virtual Imaging, Inc. is a disease and illness prevention facility that helps you and your doctor preserve your good health. We offer patients and physicians state-of-the-art technology and information to detect major preventable diseases before symptoms arise. Virtual Imaging features the Imitron C300 the world’s fastest Computed Tomography (CT) imaging platform. Virtual Imaging offers the EBCT Heart Scan, EBCT Lung Scan, EBCT Full Body Scan, and EBCT Virtual colonography (a non-invasive conoloscopy). Patients should discuss prevention with their physician; however, the scans are most useful for men and women between the ages of 40 and 73, especially if they have risk factors such as family histories of disease (cancer, heart disease, colon cancer or vascular disease), diabetes, high cholesterol, hypertension, smoking, sedentary lifestyle, or high blood pressure.
What Is EBCT?
The EBCT C300 scanner, developed by Imatron technologies, is the latest generation of diagnostic CT technology. The C300 uses patented technology called Electron Beam Computed Tomography (EBCT), a highly advanced CT technology that has no moving parts. Using a scanning electron beam rather than the standard CT x-ray tube, imaging is done at speeds up to 10 times faster and with 1/10 the radiation of other CT scanners.
Advances in imaging make the C300 the “gold standard” in heart and vascular imaging, and also allows high-resolution chest, spine, and abdominal imaging.
The C300 is non-invasive, open, and safe, and emits the lowest radiation in the CT industry and it is the only imaging technology to offer 33, 50, or 100 milliseconds (ms) True Temporal Resolution images at up to 30 frames per second. This type of capability is important because the fastest possible scan modes are required to image high and/or irregular heartbeats often associated with patients with developing or advanced heart disease.
The C300 unique capabilities enable the scanner to perform high-speed, high-volume (but very low radiation) imaging to create virtually motion-free visualizations of the heart, vessels, and other organs, allowing any specialist to see premature, pre-symptomatic heart and vascular disease, lung cancer, colon cancers, and other cancers. These “diseases,” which are preventable through early detection, account for 90% of the causes of death, disability, or loss of productivity in adult men and women over the age of 40. These diseases share common origins or “risk factors” and common prevention/wellness strategies.
Who Will Interpret My Scan?
A board-certified trained radiologist reads your scan and offers a report to you and your physician upon your request.
Why Do Doctors Support Virtual Imaging, Inc.?
Doctors recognize that, for their patients that visit Virtual Imaging, they can offer better, more accurate advice and better care. That is why over one thousand six hundred doctors from all over Georgia and the surrounding states refer their patients to us, we are here to help you and your doctor make the best use of the valuable information you receive as a result of Heart Scans and/or Full Body Scans from Virtual Imaging.
What Makes Virtual Imaging, Inc. Different?
Virtual Imaging is more than just a screening facility. It is a center specializing in the detection of common, “pre-symptomatic” diseases, cardiovascular and vascular disease, lung diseases, colon cancers and many other cancers. These diseases share numerous characteristics. They all have the potential to be treatable or preventable if diagnosed early and they share many risk factors, including diet, inactivity, smoking and family history, among others.
Following testing, a report is often provided to each patient and their physician upon request. The good news, however, is that these diseases also share many common preventive strategies. Often, such services are not readily available from doctors, and neither the doctor nor the patient knows where to turn.
The goal of Virtual Imaging is to become the premier resource that empowers individuals, in partnership with their doctors, to preserve quality of life through early detection.
What Is the Difference Between Screening and “Pre-Symptomatic” Disease?
Screening is a generic term that has both good and bad implications. For instance, should all individuals be “screened” by age 30 for cholesterol? The answer is YES. However, should all individuals with high cholesterol before age 30 be given life-long drugs to lower cholesterol? The answer is NO.
Individuals being evaluated for “pre-symptomatic” disease are those who, together with their doctor, determine that age, gender, medical history, environment, lifestyle, or heredity gives them a “better-than-even chance” for premature but preventable disease, such as heart/vascular disease, lung/colon cancer, and osteoporosis.
Using the knowledge of the presence or absence of early disease, specific recommendations can be made to help maintain personal health and wellness. It is essential to detect health problems early. The EBCT Full Body Scan is the answer.
Where Is Virtual Imaging, Inc.? What Are the Hours? What Can I Expect When I Get There?
Virtual Imaging, Inc. is located in Sandy Springs, GA at:
1140 Hammond Drive I building
Suite 9120
Atlanta, GA 30328.
Our regular hours are 9 am – 6 pm, with our first scan scheduled at 9 and our last at 4:30. Accommodations can be made for physicians, groups or persons with special circumstances.
Please call (770) 730-0119 to schedule your appointment or for more information. The only preparation required for the Ultrafast EBCT Scan is for the patient to complete a standard medical history questionnaire at the time of the appointment. There is a fasting and special prep for the Full Body Scan, please contact our office for complete information.
Do I Need My Doctor’s Prescription?
Virtual Imaging, Inc. is intended to function as an intermediary between the patient who is concerned about the potential for disease and their doctor who will be responsible for their care. The partnership between Virtual Imaging and doctors in the community is the foundation of the center’s mission.
If you do not have a current relationship with a doctor, call Virtual Imaging at (770) 730-0119 to learn about your options. Consultation directly with our medical director under established guidelines is also possible.
What Does It Cost?
For costs and fees please call our Atlanta office, you can also ask if you qualify for our unique Privileged Care Alliance Program which will offer you significant savings.
What Should I Know About Heart Disease?
Heart (or cardiovascular) disease is the leading cause of death for men and women older than 35 regardless of racial or ethnic background. Heart disease is more likely to cause a female death than breast cancer. In the United States, a person suffers from a coronary event nearly every 30 seconds, and one person dies from a coronary event nearly every minute of every day.
About half of the 1,500,000 Americans who have heart attacks each year have no warning symptoms. More than 30 percent of the fatal heart attack victims have no known risk factors. The majority of those who die suddenly would not have had abnormal cholesterol or stress tests to alert them to the potential or presence of the disease. Nearly 62 million people in the United States have one or more types of cardiovascular disease.
What Should I Know About Lung Cancer?
Lung cancer is the number one cause of cancer-related deaths in America.
In the United States, lung cancer accounts for 32 percent of cancer deaths in men and 25 percent of cancer deaths in women.
If lung cancer is detected early (when the mass is less than 5 mm), the survival rate is near 80 percent. If detected later (once the mass is 30 mm), the survival rate is less than 15 percent.
Cigarette smoking accounts for nearly 90 percent of all lung cancers and approximately 30 percent of the U.S. population actively smoke. The EBCT Lung Scan can also detect emphysema, tuberculosis and other abnormalities.
What Should I Know About Colon Cancer?
Colon cancer is the number two cause of cancer deaths in men and women and the number one cause in non-smokers.
The most common form of colon or rectal cancer, adenocarcinoma, has a five-year survival rate of 90 percent when the cancer is found and treated in an early stage, and the cancer is confined to the bowel wall.
Once the cancer has spread to the liver or lungs, the five-year survival rate is about eight percent.
The American Cancer Society predicts that this year there will be about 98,200 new cases and 48,100 deaths from colon cancer.
75 percent of colon cancers are found in “average-risk” individuals.
Virtual Imaging now performs the Virtual Colonography (non-invasive colonoscopy) using the EBCT scanner. The Virtual Colonography is a quicker, gentler noninvasive procedure that analyses 100% of the colon as well as other vital structures in the abdomen and pelvis, which allows problems such as aneurysms, tumors or degenerative changes to be identified. There is no sedation required allowing the patient to be able to safely drive after the test.
For complete information on our Virtual Colonography, please call our offices at (770) 730-0119.
