Computed tomographic detection of retroperitoneal adenopathy

This prospective study of 50 patients was designed to evaluate the effect of computed tomographic section spacing on the detection of retroperitoneal adenopathy. Contiguous 1-cm-thick sections were obtained in all patients and compared with scans obtained at 2-cm intervals in these same patients. In 45 of the 50 patients, there was agreement between the two sets of scans; in only two of the 50 cases were there major disagreements. These results suggest that scans obtained at 2-cm intervals are nearly as accurate as contiguous scans at 1-cm intervals in the detection of retroperitoneal adenopathy.