The Paul Allan prize for the best paper in Ultrasound.

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Many of you will have heard the sad news that Dr Paul Allan died suddenly in January this year, shortly before he was due to retire as Clinical Director of Radiology in Edinburgh. Paul was well known to us through his many publications in ultrasound. He authored many peer-reviewed papers and book chapters and was an editor of several well-known books, including the third edition of Clinical Ultrasound, published in 2011. Paul also made many contributions to the British Medical Ultrasound Society (BMUS), including serving as Honorary Treasurer and then President from 1998 to 2000. He was made an honorary member of BMUS in 2010. For many years, Paul was also an active member of the Shadows Radiological Travelling Club, a club founded in 1946, which meets twice a year at different locations around the UK. In recognition of Paul’s many contributions to the Shadows, the club has offered to sponsor a prize each year for the best paper published in Ultrasound. The prize of £100 will be awarded to the lead author of the best paper published in Ultrasound in each calendar year as judged by BMUS. All authors and categories of paper will be considered and the prize winner will be announced at the BMUS Annual Scientific Meeting. There is no need to apply, but you will need to submit an article via http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/ult! We begin this August issue of Ultrasound with a research article by Martin et al. on the results of an online survey of transvaginal ultrasound (TVUS) practice in the UK. The survey was publicised through several organisations, including BMUS, and is part of a programme commissioned by the Department of Health aimed at assessing safety and clinical practice in TVUS. The safety of TVUS in early pregnancy scanning is of particular concern as the transducer can be placed close to the fetus, which may then be exposed to heat generated both by ultrasound absorption and by the transducer itself. The survey showed that although most users had a general understanding of thermal and mechanical indices, some were not aware of their meaning or purpose and 40% of respondents rarely or never monitored them during scanning. This article highlights the importance of continued ultrasound safety training and promotion of safety guidelines to users. Purohit and King give a comprehensive review of the use of ultrasound in lower limb sports injuries. This article describes the mechanisms of sports injuries in muscles, tendons and ligaments, followed by well-illustrated descriptions of their ultrasound appearances. This article will be a very useful learning resource for musculoskeletal (MSK) sonographers and is available as a BMUS CPD article via the BMUS website members’ area. Hoskins and Kenwright then review the principles and development of four commercially available ultrasound technologies for vascular applications. Three-dimensional (3D) ultrasound, vector Doppler, wall motion estimation and shear wave elastography have all contributed to the understanding of vascular disease, but it seems they have not been adopted widely into clinical practice. A third review, by Abe et al. studies the literature on morphological and functional relationships of ultrasound measured muscle thickness in the leg. It seems that muscle thickness measurements can be used to predict muscle cross-sectional area and volume in several thigh and lower leg muscles. However, there is little evidence relating muscle function with muscle thickness. A further article in the long running PoCUS series, by Lewis et al. reviews the accuracy of ultrasound in detecting foreign bodies and describes ultrasound techniques for identifying and guiding the removal of various types of foreign body materials. Ultrasound is a cost effective tool for dealing with foreign bodies in the emergency department and can be accurate in the hands of trained emergency physicians. This issue concludes with two case studies. Drought et al. describe the finding of bilateral congenital cataracts in a fetus during a second trimester anomaly scan. They propose that examination of the face and orbits should become a routine part of the fetal anomaly survey, especially where there is a risk of genetic syndromes. Brownfoot et al. describe a rare case of persistent reversed end diastolic flow in the fetal middle cerebral artery. Few such cases have ever been reported and the outcome is normally poor, but this case demonstrates that treatment may be possible if an urgent follow up is made.