Lung Ultrasound and CT Assessment of Lung Injury in COVID-19: Which One is Better

Computerized tomography (CT) is the gold standard of imaging technique for lung injury. During the early outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, lung CT played an important role in screening and classification. With the development of COVID-19, patients' lung CT presents different lesion types and ranges. Correspondingly, Lung ultrasonography can help to quickly screen for the potential causes of respiratory failure in COVID-19 patients, which takes advantages of convenience, high-accuracy, non-radiation, and fewer transmission in hospital. Moreover, lung ultrasonography is useful for continuous and dynamic management of COVID-19. It dynamically monitors the disease progression; evaluates the effectiveness of the prone position ventilation; and guides ventilation settings, weaning, and extracorporeal membrane therapy. However, lung ultrasonography has limitations on identifying over-inflation, operator dependence, and so on. Clinicians should take advantages of lung CT and ultrasonography and make each modality complementary to the other for promoting precise strategic treatment of COVID-19 patients.