Advancements in health-related fields and future directions

¶ … Future of Nursing

One of the most amazing recent developments in medicine has been the ability to make precise images of the brain. Some of them show the structure of the brain in great detail while others actually show the brain at work -- making images of how the person thinks.

The anatomy of the brain can be shown in great detail using structural Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI's), and the operation, or ongoing function of the brain, can be shown in functional MRI's, or ƒMRI's. MRI's take advantage of the high water content of our body and use a magnetic field to align water molecules. They return to their original positions at different rates depending on the type of tissue, providing detailed images.

MRI's aren't new, of course, and ƒMRI's are being used more and more, but they show the tremendous potential for information. In the study looked at for this report, various imaging techniques have been used to chart the progress of brain shrinkage from alcoholism. In addition they have demonstrated at least partial recovery if the person stops using alcohol.

Other imaging techniques have been able to look at the brain at the neuron level. This technology is a specialized kind of MRI called diffusion tensor imaging (or DTI). This kind of imaging can image not only different types of neurons, such as those making up white matter compared to those making up gray matter, but DTI's can pinpoint specific damage in very precise ways.

We already know that many psychiatric disorders have a genetic component. Imaging has shown us that some psychiatric disorders either involve or even cause differences in brain structure. We also know that researchers have developed a huge array of medications that can help treat psychiatric disorders.

I think detailed brain imaging, especially things such as ƒMRI's and other methods that show the brain as it functions, will cause a tremendous increase in our knowledge regarding all sorts of brain-based diseases -- not just psychiatric disorders but such illnesses as Parkinson's and Alzheimer's. These new imaging methods will help researchers find new treatments, but if this research on alcoholism is any indication, they will also eventually be able to tell us which treatments are most effective. We will be able to tell this not only for diseases but for individuals with those diseases as well.

All of this is happening at a time when nurses are being given more and more responsibility. As technology becomes more familiar and simplified, it seems likely that some of these tests, if not their interpretations, will fall within the responsibility of nurses such as nurse practitioners.

This imaging technology will affect medical care in other ways, too. If they can view the brain as it functions, they may be able to use such technology to see exactly what is going on in cancerous tumors, and evaluate the effectiveness of the cancer drugs that have been selected for a patient.