Published June 20, 2019 | Version v1
Journal article Metadata-only

Monitoring of fatigue in radiologists during prolonged image interpretation using fNIRS

Creators

  • 1. Komaki City Hospital, Department of Radiology (Japan)
  • 2. Nagoya Jhohoku Radiology Clinic (Japan)
  • 3. Nagoya University Graduate School of Medicine, Department of Radiology (Japan)
  • 4. Anjo Kosei Hospital, Department of Radiology (Japan)
  • 5. Nagoya University Graduate School of Medicine, Department of Radiological and Medical Laboratory Sciences (Japan)
  • 6. Aichi Medical University, Department of Radiology (Japan)
  • 7. Spectratech, Inc. (Japan)

Description

Purpose

To determine whether functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) allows monitoring fatigue in radiologists during prolonged image interpretation.

Materials and methods

Nine radiologists participated as subjects in the present study and continuously interpreted medical images and generated reports for cases for more than 4 h under real clinical work conditions. We measured changes in oxygenated hemoglobin concentrations [oxy-Hb] in the prefrontal cortex using 16-channel fNIRS (OEG16ME, Spectratech) every hour during the Stroop task to evaluate fatigue of radiologists and recorded fatigue scale (FS) as a behavior data.

Results

Two subjects showed a subjective feeling of fatigue and an apparent decrease in brain activity after 4 h, so the experiment was completed in 4 h. The remaining seven subjects continued the experiment up to 5 h. FS decreased with time, and a significant reduction was observed between before and the end of image interpretation. Seven out of nine subjects showed a minimum [oxy-Hb] change at the end of prolonged image interpretation. The mean change of [oxy-Hb] at the end of all nine subjects was significantly less than the maximum during image interpretation.

Conclusion

fNIRS using the change of [oxy-Hb] may be useful for monitoring fatigue in radiologists during image interpretation.

Additional details

Identifiers

DOI
10.1007/s11604-019-00826-2;

Publishing Information

Journal Title
Japanese Journal of Radiology (Print)
Journal Volume
37
Journal Issue
6
Journal Page Range
p. 437-448
ISSN
1867-1071

INIS

Country of Publication
Japan
Country of Input or Organization
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA)
INIS RN
54085174
Subject category
S62: RADIOLOGY AND NUCLEAR MEDICINE;
Descriptors DEI
ABSORPTION SPECTROSCOPY; BRAIN; CONCENTRATION RATIO; FATIGUE; HEMOGLOBIN; IMAGES; INFRARED SPECTRA
Descriptors DEC
BODY; CARBOXYLIC ACIDS; CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM; DIMENSIONLESS NUMBERS; GLOBINS; HETEROCYCLIC ACIDS; HETEROCYCLIC COMPOUNDS; MECHANICAL PROPERTIES; NERVOUS SYSTEM; ORGANIC ACIDS; ORGANIC COMPOUNDS; ORGANIC NITROGEN COMPOUNDS; ORGANS; PIGMENTS; PORPHYRINS; PROTEINS; SPECTRA; SPECTROSCOPY

Optional Information

Copyright
Copyright (c) 2019 Japan Radiological Society