X-ray sphere, 1934

Rotating X-ray anode tubes from Siemens can withstand much greater loads than their conventional counterparts. The company launched the X-ray sphere in 1934. It could be connected directly to the lighting circuit and was used all over the world up to the nineteen seventies.

Betatron 15-MeV, 1952

A betatron generating 6 million electron volts was produced by Siemens in 1944 after pioneering work which started in the mid thirties. Modern betatrons generate over 40 million electron volts. They are used to produce extremely hard X-rays for examining materials and, in medicine, to administer high-energy radiotherapy.

The world’s first echocardiograph (with the pioneers in the field, Inge Edler and Hellmuth Hertz), 1953

In 1953, Siemens provided the pioneers in echocardiography, Inge Edler and Hellmuth Hertz (Lund, Sweden), with the world’s first echocardiograph for research purposes. Today, this powerful ultrasound process is a standard part of all cardiovascular examinations.

Cardiac pacemaker, implanted for the first time in 1958

The world's first cardiac pacemaker - developed by Siemens-Elema - was implanted in 1958 in a critically ill heart patient in Sweden who suffered up to twenty cardiac arrests daily. The surgeon Dr. Senning performed the operation after having conducted previous experiments on dogs.

VIDOSON ultrasound diagnostic system, 1965

In 1965, Siemens introduced VIDOSON, the world’s first real-time ultrasound diagnostic device. Because of its harmlessness, this real-time cross-section process was immediately adopted for a wide range of applications in obstetrics and gynecology. Today, it is the most widely applied imaging process in virtually every branch of medicine.

Nuclear magnetic resonance tomograph Magnetom Open viva

Siemens began developing the Magnetom family in 1983 and ten years later introduced the first freely accessible nuclear magnetic resonance tomograph, the Magnetom Open. With the aid of powerful magnetic fields, it supplied cross-sectional images of the highest quality without exposing the patient to radiation (X-rays). The sectional images allowed tissues and organs to be detected more clearly than ever before.

PET Scanner

Siemens set a further milestone with positron emission tomography (PET). The PET scanner measures several layers simultaneously with unrivalled spatial resolution and sensitivity. This makes it an important diagnostic tool in the field of nuclear medicine.

Specialists exchange information via data lines

The hospital system of the Cleveland Clinic Foundation comprises a network of seven hospitals and ten outpatients' centers distributed over a radius of 75 km. PACS (Picture Archiving & Communication System) enables fifty radiologists to evaluate over 500,000 examinations each year for the main campus, the networked hospitals and the outpatients' centers. Images, findings and the associated information are also forwarded to over 1,000 referring institutions.