RSNA Meeting Chicago IL 2018 | Radiological Society of North America

I was able to attend the Radiological Society of North America’s (RSNA) 104th Scientific Assembly and Annual Meeting at McCormick Place in Chicago, IL, which occurred from November 25 to November 30, 2018. The annual meeting is a very large gathering of industry leaders in medical imaging, radiologists, and other related industry professionals. This was the 104th Scientific Assembly and Annual Meeting with the tagline: Tomorrow’s Radiology today. This year brought back much emphasis on machine learning and 3D printing. As usual there were many exhibitors with new medical imaging devices ready to discuss and provide demonstrations. In particular there were a few 1st time exhibitors I was excited to see including EMTensor and Butterfly Network. There was also a U.S. market debut by United Imaging Healthcare which had a large exhibitor space. As usual there were also numerous posters and presentations.

This year brought back the popular deep learning classroom presented by the NVIDIA Deep Learning Institute (DLI) designed for attendees to engage with deep learning tools, write algorithms and improve their understanding of deep learning technology. In one session, called Introduction to Deep Learning, attendees used convolutional neural networks (CNNs) along with a MedNIST data set that consists of 1,000 images each from 5 different categories: Chest X-ray, hand X-ray, Head CT, Chest CT, Abdomen CT, and Breast MRI. The task was for the attendees to identify the image type. Another session focused on 3D segmentation of Brain MR using deep learning methods for segmentation, particularly V-nets.

This year also brought back the machine learning showcase which allowed for the opportunity to network with nearly 80 companies on the forefront of the developments in machine learning and artificial intelligence. This year introduced a new showcase called the 3D printing & advanced visualization showcase which focused on groundbreaking technology in 3D printing, virtual reality and augmented reality. Another new feature this year was a Recruiters Row which allow for attendees to connect with organizations offering career opportunities. Like last year there was also a start-up showcase that featured emerging companies bringing innovations in medical imaging.

I was able to attend a few educational courses and scientific sessions. In particular I attended a session titled Image Processing in Imaging and Radiation Therapy and another session titled Deep Learning in Radiology: How Do We Do It? In the former session I was intrigued by the talk from ImBio which trained a CNN to create quality ventricle segmentations with only 43 scans in the training dataset and used data augmentations to improve the performance on the test dataset and another talk from researchers at the University of Chicago to classify chest radiographs as anteroposterior or posteroanterior. The latter session as indicated above I attended featured insights into deep learning in radiology at The Ohio State University, Stanford University, and the Mayo Clinic Rochester.

Below are some of the pictures I took while at the RSNA annual meeting in 2018, in Chicago, IL.