Incidental Findings On Imaging: When Ignoring Them Is Malpractice
An incidental finding is an unexpected abnormality discovered during a medical imaging study that was ordered for a different reason. The term “incidentaloma” is commonly used when the finding is a mass or lesion — a nodule on the lung found during a chest X-ray for a broken rib, a lesion on the liver spotted during an abdominal CT for appendicitis, a thyroid nodule noticed on an ultrasound of the neck.