Medical Imaging

Medical imaging refers to the techniques and processes used to create images of the human body for clinical purposes (medical procedures seeking to reveal, diagnose or examine disease) or medical science (including the study of normal anatomy and function). As a discipline and in its widest sense, it is part of biological imaging and incorporates radiology, radiological sciences, endoscopy, (medical) thermography, medical photography and microscopy . Measurement and recording techniques which are not primarily designed to produce images, such as electroencephalography (EEG) and magnetoencephalography (MEG) and others, but which produce data susceptible to be represented as maps ,can be seen as forms of medical imaging.

In the clinical context, medical imaging is generally equated to radiology or "clinical imaging" and the medical practitioner responsible for interpreting (and sometimes acquiring) the images is a radiologist. Diagnostic radiography designates the technical aspects of medical imaging and in particular the acquisition of medical images. The radiographer or radiologic technologist is usually responsible for acquiring medical images of diagnostic quality, although some radiological interventions are performed by radiologists.