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Medical Coaches Delivers First Mobile Ready PET/CT in the World
The Very First Mobile PET/CT Unit.
KNOXVILLE, Tenn., April 15, 2003 - CTI Molecular Imaging, Inc.(Nasdaq: CTMI)
and Medical Coaches, Inc., a privately held firm based in Oneonta, NY, announced
today they have completed the manufacture and sale of the industry's first
ever mobile PET/CT unit, which utilizes CTI's REVEAL ® RT PET/CT scanner.
"The REVEAL RT scanner is a major health care advance that allows medical specialists to see both the structure and molecular activity of various diseases and health disorders," said Terry Douglass, PhD, chairman and chief executive officer of CTI Molecular Imaging. "Working with us, Medical Coaches has helped improve patient access to this beneficial test. Mobile imaging providers now will be able to offer this technology to smaller medical sites that previously did not have the scale or financial resources to provide this service. With our joint development of the first mobile PET/CT, CTI and Medical Coaches have opened up a new market of PET/CT customers."
The Interior of the Mobile PET/CT Unit.
"Because of the PET/CT unit's size and sensitivity to motion, standard
trailer platforms used for other mobile medical services wouldn't work," says
Chad Smith, Medical Coaches director of marketing for mobile MRI and PET systems. "We
developed a proprietary design system utilizing aircraft construction principles
that allowed us to build a coach that maintains the PET/CT unit's stability
and alignment."
Other mobile units are under construction, Smith said, and order fulfillments for mobile PET/CT units will be from stock, if available, or 30 to 60 days from the time of booking. Medical Coaches, Inc. is ISO-certified.
About CTI:
CTI Molecular Imaging, Inc. is a leading supplier of products and services
for positron emission tomography (PET), a diagnostic imaging technology used
in the detection and treatment of cancer, neurological disorders and cardiac
disease. Additional information is available at: www.ctimi.com.
About Medical Coaches:
Medical Coaches, Inc., is a family-owned business that has manufactured more
than 20,000 highly specialized mobile medical units located in more than
100 countries It was founded in 1950 and is headquartered in Oneonta, NY.
About PET and PET/CT:
PET images the biology of diseases at the molecular level often before anatomic
changes are visible or, in some cases, before symptoms appear. Diseases are
biological processes and it is these processes that PET examines. PET/CT is
a new imaging technology that combines the biological examination of patients
by PET with the CT images of the body's structural detail. PET/CT technology
improves the treatment management of patients by providing surgeons, radiation
therapists and other physicians precise anatomical landmarks associated with
the disease condition as determined by PET.
PET's whole-body imaging capability helps physicians improve their ability
to determine the location, extent and stage of cancer, neurological disorders
and cardiac disease. By improving diagnosis, PET scans aid physicians in selecting
better courses of treatment, as well as assessing whether treatment is effective
or should be changed. Recent published clinical trials have shown that in a
wide array of cancers, the use of PET has caused the treatment to be changed
for 15 to 50% of patients, depending on the specific clinical question. In
addition, PET and PET/CT provide both the patient and their physician with
a degree of certainty that is often unavailable through other imaging methods.