Dear Dr Frank. You see very highly fixated on medical issues these days, what with your teeth, you “broken ribs”, your spinal manipulation and now this. I wonder if there is something else going on.
But, to give you a more compete answer, Computed Tomography (so called CT or CAT scans) are useful for detected a wide variety of ailments, not just what has been listed above. They can be used for evaluating bone, blood and soft tissues like organs. Depending on how the study is set up (i.e. if intravenous contrast, a “highlighting” material is given), and how quickly the scan is done, it can be used to look for strokes, bleeding, infection, cancer, bone injuries, lung injuries, and many other uses.
However, ebenezer is off base regarding ligament/tendon injuries. True “soft tissue injuries” like muscle tears and torn ligaments are best detected by Magnetic Resonance Imaging (or MRI). I don’t know what injury you are concerned about, but I doubt you will get an MRI (or even CT scan) in the ER.