Code: Select all
\section{Closing Remarks.}
The Cleveland Clinic's online monograph, ``Hepatitis C Management'' notes the following regarding liver biopsy~\cite{CC:online}.
\begin{quote}
For all its advantages, liver biopsy has several important disadvantages. Among them are cost, the risk of complications, the need for additional health care resources, patient and physician aversion to the procedure, inadequate specimen size, and the lack of specific findings.
Approximately 20\% to 50\% of patients will experience significant pain following percutaneous liver biopsy. More severe complications—such as pneumothorax, major bleeding, inadvertent biopsy of the kidney or colon, and perforation of the gallbladder—have been reported in a fraction of patients (0.57\%). There have even been a few reports of death.
\end{quote}
Now consider the 2007 MRE-based study by Yin and collegues which indicates the excellent diagnostic accuracy of assessing hepatic fbrosis non-invasively, cf. Figure~\ref{fig:Fibrosis}~\cite{Yin:2007CGH}. In the case of liver disease, when compared to the potental risk and hardship associated with traditional hepatic biopsy practices the potential of a robust clinical MRE technology to advance the state of the art in world health care is tremendous.
\begin{figure}[htb]
\centering
\includegraphics[width=0.65\textwidth]{figs/ClinicalTool.PNG}
\caption[Short Caption for Table of Contents]{MRE of the liver in a normal volunteer and a patient with cirrhosis. Anatomic images (left), wave images (middle), and elastogram (right). The elastograms show that the mean shear modulus of the fibrotic liver is much higher than that of a normal liver~\cite{Yin:2007CGH}.}
\label{fig:Fibrosis}
\end{figure}
MRE owes its achievement, in part, .....
