The Kremlin

High-Tech Images Show That Yeltsin's O.K.

On Dec. 19, Moscow reported that Boris Yeltsin was undergoing a normal follow-up to his 1996 heart-bypass surgery. In fact, he underwent a sophisticated new heart scan called a C.T.-angiography, a painless, noninvasive test that is less risky than a conventional angiogram and that can be performed only with a scanner created by Imatron, a San Francisco-based company. Radiologists at the Moscow Cardiology Center had just begun learning to use the machine when Imatron began getting E-mails from them: they wanted to use the scanner--which can tell if a bypass graft has closed up--on Yeltsin. Imatron stepped up the tutorial; now...

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