Yale Bulletin and Calendar

December 6-13, 1999

Volume 28, Number 15

Doctor helps design Disney exhibit
on high-tech world of radiology

Dr. Bruce McClennan, professor and chair of diagnostic radiology at the School of Medicine, recently collaborated with Walt Disney World to create an interactive exhibit on radiology at the Epcot Center.

McClennan helped plan the exhibit "Radiology: Medicine's New Vision" with colleagues from the Radiologic Society of North America (RSNA), the largest professional radiology society in the world.

The display, which opened in October, showcases the role of radiologists in today's medicine and helps explain the many new uses of radiology for both treatment and therapy.

Inside the exhibit under a mini-geodesic dome, a video presentation using surround-sound helps Disney guides take guests through a series of real-life situations, such as a child being treated for leukemia and other nuclear medicine studies. "They are real-life videos of what a radiologist does daily," McClennan explains.

The exhibit also features an arcade with several video games, including "Cell Smash," in which visitors to the center can blast a cancer cell, and "Brain Game," which takes them on a virtual ride through the brain. Another display gives visitors a realistic idea of what it's like to perform angioplasty by letting them try their hand at the task. "I crashed the computer on my first try," says McClennan.

The concept for the exhibit originated within RSNA's Public Information Advisory Committee, which counts McClennan among its members. The RSNA brought the idea for the exhibit and the committee's recommendations for what it should entail to Disney, which created the exhibit within a year.

"Since radiology has all the high-tech bells, whistles and tools for clinicians, we believed it would make a good story," says McClennan, noting that the display was designed "to showcase the role of the radiologist separate from the technology."

Advisers from RSNA worked closely with the Disney engineers, who call themselves "imagineers," and helped train the guides for the exhibit. The RSNA has invested $3 million in the project. Funding has also been set aside for an additional two years.

"The exhibit demystifies radiology and shows just what is at our fingertips in radiology at the end of this millennium," McClennan says, noting that the display encompasses "the whole family of radiology, from diagnosis to treatment -- from interventional radiologists who do balloon angioplasties and treat kidney stones, to therapists who treat cancer with radiation. Disney did a spectacular job at capturing the field as it is while focusing on the radiologists."

The exhibit, located on the left side of Future World in the Innoventions area at Epcot, will run for a year. Of the 10 or so exhibits in the millennium section of Innoventions, "Radiology" is the only medical exhibit.

-- By Thomas R. Violante

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