Report on visit to Medway Hospital.

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AS Physics Coursework -

Report on visit to Medway Hospital.

At the hospital we were taken round many departments in which physics could be seen clearly at work, I have chosen to look specifically at X-rays and Ultrasound.

Ultrasound

Ultrasound is used mainly in three areas of medicine; Obstetrics, Cardiology and Urology. Ultrasound is most widely known for its uses in Obstetrics which is the branch of medicine which deals with women through pregnancy and child birth.

During pregnancy Ultrasound can be used to check the size of the foetus to estimate the due date, the sex of the baby, the position of the foetus, to detect an ectopic pregnancy or even to monitor the baby during specialist procedures such as amniocentesis. This is just a brief outline of how ultrasound is used in Obstetrics.

Ultrasound is used in Cardiology to identify abnormal structures of the heart and to measure blood flow through the heart and major blood vessel. In Urology it is used to detect prostrate cancer early, to find kidney stones and to measure blood flow through the kidney.

An ultrasound wave is a high energy longitudinal wave, it operates at a frequency higher than the human ear can detect.

Ultrasound is used in medicine in the following way. A special gel is applied to the part of the body which is to be scanned this acts as a coupling agent so that the waves pass right into the body without having to pass through air first.
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The machine then emits ultrasound waves through special pads into the gel and then to the body. The wave is absorbed by some tissue but passes through others and is reflected by still more. The reflected waves travel back up through the body into a sensor which is linked to the ultrasound machine.

It then generates a moving image based on the data it receives from the sensor which is also located in the pad. Knowing which tissues reflect ultrasound and which do not the operator can identify from the images different parts of a persons ...

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