The Society of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography (SCCT) has released an expert consensus document standardizing medical terminology commonly used in clinical and research activities related to cardiac computed tomography (CT). The update takes a multimodality approach, with contributions from five co-authoring societies and three endorsing societies. Image courtesy: Getty Images
June 27, 2023 — The Society of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography (SCCT) has released an expert consensus document standardizing medical terminology commonly used in clinical and research activities related to cardiac computed tomography (CT), providing an update to guidance published 12 years ago by the society in the Journal of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography (JCCT).
“Standardized Medical Terminology for Cardiac Computed Tomography 2023 Update” is co-authored, co-published or endorsed by eight national and international societies across cardiac imaging modalities. It offers expert consensus on vocabulary commonly used for all aspects of cardiac CT, including acquisition protocol and post-processing analysis. The multi-society update, detailed in a June 21 online SCCT news summary, stems from terminology previously unified by a consensus agreement of cardiologists, medical physicists and radiologists, originally published in 2011. The document will be co-published in Radiology: Cardiothoracic Imaging, a journal of RSNA.
“This is an update to the prior dated document with modernized terminology for evolving technology, including new photon counting computed tomographic machines,” said writing group co-chair and corresponding author Lynne Koweek, MD, FACR, FSCCT, Duke University School of Medicine Radiology Professor. She added, “Standardized terminology allows for consistency in communication across all members of the imaging community and will assist with clinical care and multicenter trials.”
The document was created to consolidate regularly used abbreviations and terms, as well as provide clear definitions for terms applicable to cardiac CT, a field involving a wide span of contributor types that “continues to expand with increasing applications and evolving technology," according to the writing group, led by co-chairs Koweek, Suhny Abbara, MD, FACR, MSCCT, UT Southwestern Medical Center, and Marcus Y. Chen, MD.
The update takes a multimodality approach, with contributions from five co-authoring societies – SCCT, American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM), American College of Radiology (ACR), North American Society for Cardiovascular Imaging (NASCI) and Radiological Society of North America (RSNA) – and three endorsing societies: the Asian Society of Cardiovascular Imaging (ASCI), European Association of Cardiovascular Imaging (EACVI) and The European Society of Cardiovascular Radiology (ESCR).
Additions for version 2.0 include expanding CT technology and radiology lexicon standard terminology. The authors placed emphasis on updating prior terminology to contemporary technology, expanding uses of cardiac CT and CT angiography (CTA), and consistency with the RADLEX terminology.
The document, “Standardized Medical Terminology for Cardiac Computed Tomography 2023 Update: An Expert Consensus Document of the Society of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography (SCCT), American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM), American College of Radiology (ACR), North American Society for Cardiovascular Imaging (NASCI) and Radiological Society of North America (RSNA),” was authored by the following: Lynne Koweek, MD, FSCCT, FACR; Stephan Achenbach, MD; Daniel S. Berman, MD; J. Jeffrey Carr, MD, MSc, MSCCT; Ricardo C. Cury, MD, MBA, MSCCT; Brian Ghoshhajra, MD, MBA, FSCCT; Diana Litmanovich, MD; Cynthia H. McCollough, PhD FAAPM, FACR, FAIMBE; Allen J. Taylor, MD; Quynh A. Truong, MD, MPH, FSCCT; Jia Wang, PhD; W. Guy Weigold, MD; Armin Arbab-Zadeh, MD, PhD, MPH, FSCCT; Suhny Abbara, MD FACR, MSCCT; and Marcus Y. Chen, MD.
The authors offered the following on the importance of the update, published in JCCT June 20, 2023:
“Since the emergence of cardiac computed tomography (Cardiac CT) at the turn of the 21st century, there has been an exponential growth in research and clinical development of the technique, with contributions from investigators and clinicians from varied backgrounds: physics and engineering, informatics, cardiology, and radiology. However, terminology for the field is not unified. As a consequence, there are multiple abbreviations for some terms, multiple terms for some concepts, and some concepts that lack clear definitions and/or usage. In an effort to aid the work of all those who seek to contribute to the literature, clinical practice, and investigation of the field, the Society of Cardiovascular Computed Tomography updates a standard set of medical terms commonly used in clinical and research activities related to cardiac CT.”
More information, www.SCCT.org
References:
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcct.2023.06.002
February 02, 2026 
