Ground glass opacity is named after its visual appearance on a CT scan. Information I can find (and I’m not a doctor, don’t trust me at face value!) suggests that it’s generally reversible and doesn’t indicate any more severity than the pneumonia it’s detecting.
The obvious question to reconcile the Diamond Princess and Veneto is: do the tests have subclinical thresholds, and if so are they different? I don’t know where to begin researching that, though. (And as a more general concern, I worry the entire line of questioning might be overfitting, maybe there’s some random reason that has nothing to do with the general pandemic.)
You’re right re the “ground glass”, it’s describing what the lung looks like on imaging and is very non-specific. (Many etiologies and a long list of differential diagnoses).
Ground glass opacity is named after its visual appearance on a CT scan. Information I can find (and I’m not a doctor, don’t trust me at face value!) suggests that it’s generally reversible and doesn’t indicate any more severity than the pneumonia it’s detecting.
The obvious question to reconcile the Diamond Princess and Veneto is: do the tests have subclinical thresholds, and if so are they different? I don’t know where to begin researching that, though. (And as a more general concern, I worry the entire line of questioning might be overfitting, maybe there’s some random reason that has nothing to do with the general pandemic.)
You’re right re the “ground glass”, it’s describing what the lung looks like on imaging and is very non-specific. (Many etiologies and a long list of differential diagnoses).
A good article re ground-glass opacification and what might have caused it.