Dual Energy X-Ray Absorptiometry (DXA) Transmission Methodology in Clinical Trials

Dual Energy X-Ray Absorptiometry (DXA) has become the “gold standard” technique for the assessment of bone mineral density (BMD). More recently, this type of trial data has been handled by specialist quality assurance (QA) centers partly at the recommendation of regulatory agencies. The data are generally transmitted via paper and/or diskette from the site to the QA center. The aims of this study were to test the feasibility of transmitting these types of image flies of about 80kBytes from the investigator site to the QA center directly via modem. One hundred sixty images and related data were transmitted transat-lantically, without error and at a lower cost than using conventional methodologies. The time from patient DXA scan to QA review was also significantly shortened, thereby improving data quality further.