AIRP Case Submission

AIRP Case Submission and Preparation for Radiology Residents:

 

For full description, please visit the AIRP website directly at http://www.airp.org/case_prep.html

AIRP COURSE INSTRUCTIONS
Residents attending the AIRP Radiologic Pathology Correlation Course are required to submit ONE pathologically proven case illustrating a radiologic-pathologic correlation. If a resident chooses to submit TWO pathologically proven cases, the resident will receive a complimentary copy of the next edition of the Radiologic Pathology Syllabus.

Case packages MUST be submitted ELECTRONICALLY through the AIRP Case Package web application. Students may not bring case package(s) to the course. Only pathologic material (slides or paraffin blocks) will be submitted at the course. (See instructions for “Pathologic Material” below.) These will be collected the first day at registration.

IMPORTANT NOTE REGARDING SILVERLIGHT: The AIRP Case Package web application requires installation of Microsoft’s Silverlight (http://www.microsoft.com/silverlight/ ). If administrative privileges are required to install software at your institution, we recommend burning the DICOM studies onto a CD first, so that case packages may be worked on and submitted from your own personal computer at home.

ANONYMIZATION REQUIRED
In compliance with HIPAA privacy laws, all images and documentation must be anonymized. Any information such as patient names, patient IDs, and social security numbers contained within the DICOM metadata, burned-in pixel data, or documentation must be removed so that no one can trace the images or documentation back to the patient.

CASE PACKAGE SUBMISSIONS ARE FINAL
Students may work on any component of their case package in any desired order and can make any changes as necessary before electronically submitting their case package to AIRP. However, students may not make any changes to their case package after submission.

CASE PACKAGE REJECTION
After a case package is electronically submitted to AIRP, it may be rejected after review by the AIRP section chief if it is found to be lacking in quality or material. Students will then be required to re-submit the sections of their case package that were deemed insufficient. Students will only have access to the sections of their case package which require re-submission. Program Directors will be notified of rejected cases.

CASE PACKAGE COMPONENTS FOR ONLINE SUBMISSION
Case Data Entry
Required Documentation
Required Images
Case Summary
Case Data Entry Information
Students will need to provide the following information and respond to the following questions under the Case Data Entry section of their case package:

Organ System, Organ Location, Organ Distribution
Diagnosis/diagnoses and findings
Specimen ID number/surgical pathology numbers
Patient’s sex, race, age, date of birth
Pathologist’s name, phone number, fax number
Contributing hospital’s name and address
Do you have plans to publish this case?
Has this case been previously published? If yes, please list journal references.
Clinical summary
Operative summary
Pathology summary
Gross pathology summary
*Note: Summaries should NOT be “copy and pastes” of reports. Students must actually summarize the reports and note pertinent findings.
Students should print a copy of their completed Case Data Entry page and bring it with them along with their pathologic material to the course.

Required Documentation
Students are required to upload the following documentation:

Pathology report(s) OR autopsy report(s) OR if applicable, BOTH
Operative report(s) OR procedural report(s) OR if applicable, BOTH
Radiology report(s)
Discharge summary (OPTIONAL)
Required Images

Radiologic
Gross specimen
Histologic
*Note: Digital histologic images are not a substitute for pathologic material. Students who are not able to bring pathologic material must be granted an exception (please see below). Students can optionally upload digital histologic images in addition to bringing their pathologic material should they have such digital images available.

Radiologic Images
Students are required to upload a minimum of one DICOM study for their radiologic images. All radiologic images must be in DICOM format. If only hard copy films are available at your institution, these films must be digitized and saved in a DICOM format. We will not accept radiologic images in the form of JPEG or TIFF files. DICOM studies may be uploaded in any order.
If a student is requesting a CD of the DICOM studies from a PACS administrator (versus directly getting the DICOM files from a network), the following procedures and information may be helpful:

Burn each DICOM study on a separate CD
For each DICOM study, note how many series are contained within that DICOM study
For each DICOM study, note the total number of files for each DICOM series within that DICOM study.
Recording the total number of DICOM series per case, and recording the total number of files in each DICOM series may better ensure that all files are uploaded, as intended. The CDs can also serve as a helpful record of the DICOM studies uploaded as radiologic images.
It is the student’s responsibility to make sure that the TOTAL NUMBER of files received by AIRP for each DICOM series is indeed the total number of files intended to be uploaded for the case.
The AIRP Case Package web application is only able to report the study name as taken from the DICOM metadata and the number of files received for each DICOM series.

GROSS SPECIMEN IMAGES
Gross specimen images must be oriented to correlate the gross morphology of the disease with the radiologic findings. Images of the resected specimen or an autopsy are best suited for this purpose; however, intra-operative, endoscopic,
bronchoscopic, laparoscopic or arthroscopic images are also acceptable.
Gross images taken with a digital camera are only acceptable when taken at full resolution using a three- (3) megapixel or greater camera (MINIMUM resolution required is 300 dpi).

PATHOLOGIC MATERIAL
Original or recut histologic material (on glass slides or paraffin blocks) must be brought to the course FOR EACH CASE. Students are required to bring this material to registration on the first day of the course. Slides must be properly secured in a transportable slide container, accompanied by a print-out of the AIRP Case Data Entry page, which lists the specimen number(s) entered by the student. The specimen numbers on the pathologic material must match the specimen numbers on the patient’s pathology report in order for the case to be accepted.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Students who are not able to bring in pathologic material (e.g. students who can not bypass airport customs carrying pathologic material) must be granted an exception by AIRP. Students should send an email to AIRPCasePackageHelp@acr.org if they need to be granted an exception. If a student has been granted an exception, the email notifying the student of the exception granted should be uploaded with the path report, and histologic images must be uploaded electronically using the Histologic uploader in the “Upload Images” section of their case package..

Gross specimen and histology images must be in uncompressed JPEG or TIFF format. PowerPoint presentation submissions for gross and histology images are not acceptable.

CASE SUMMARY
Students are required to upload and provide the following information within the case summary section of their case package:

Clinical history
Representative images in JPEG or TIFF format that must be taken from the radiologic and gross specimen images that were uploaded by the student. (Minimum resolution required: 300 dpi, see gross specimen images section)
Descriptions
Diagnosis
Pathology
Treatment
Prognosis
3-5 Literature References