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(Radiology. 2000;217:309-318.)
© RSNA, 2000

Reflections

Evolution of Diagnostic Neuroradiology from 1904 to 19991

Norman E. Leeds, MD and Stephen A. Kieffer, MD

1 From the Department of Diagnostic Radiology, University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, 1515 Holcombe Blvd, Box 57, Houston, TX 77030 (N.E.L.), and the Department of Radiology, State University of New York, Upstate Medical Center, Syracuse, NY (S.K.). Received December 8, 1999; revision requested January 4, 2000; revision received April 5; accepted April 21. Address correspondence to N.E.L. (e-mail: nleeds@mdanderson.org).

Neuroradiology began in the early 1900s soon after Roentgen discovered x rays, with the use of skull radiographs to evaluate brain tumors. This was followed by the development of ventriculography in 1918, pneumoencephalography in 1919, and arteriography in 1927. In the beginning, air studies were the primary modality, but this technique was supplanted by angiography in the 1950s and 1960s. The first full-time neuroradiologist in the United States was Cornelius G. Dyke at the New York Neurological Institute in 1930. Neuroradiology took a firm hold as a specialty in the early 1960s when Dr Juan M. Taveras brought together fourteen neuroradiologists from the United States and Canada to establish the nucleus of what was to become the American Society of Neuroradiology, or ASNR. This society’s initial goals were to perform research and to advance knowledge within the specialty. Neuroradiologists initially were able to diagnose vascular disease, infections, tumors, trauma, and alterations in cerebrospinal fluid flow, because the brain structure was invisible. Neuroradiology was forever changed with computed tomography (CT) because the brain structure became visible. Soon thereafter, magnetic resonance (MR) imaging was developed, and it not only provided anatomic but also made possible vascular and physiologic functional imaging.

Index terms: Brain, CT, 10.1211 • Brain, MR, 10.1214 • Cerebral angiography, 10.124 • Myelography, 30.122 • Radiology and radiologists, history • Reflections • Spinal cord, MR, 30.1214