History of cardiac radiology.

T he last century has witnessed extraordinary advances in the capacity to display the heart borders and its interior anatomy in living subjects I 1 1. Fluoroscopy and radiography were first used and described in I 896, within months of Roentgen’s discovery of X-rays. In the early part of the 20th century, plain film findings for heart disease began to be characterized and recorded in the literature. Although angiocardiography was based on developments in the 1920s and before, its introduction in clinical subjects awaited the 1930s, and its evolution to modern form took place in the I 940s and 1950s, together with aortography. The feasibility ofeoronary arteriography was demonstrated and its use spread during the 1960s. Echocardiography, isotope studies of the heart, CT, and MR imaging are later developments not covered in this account, which focuses primarily on conventional radiology and angiocardiography.