Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women worldwide. Two million women are diagnosed annually, resulting in 685,000 annual deaths. Early diagnosis is critical to reducing mortality. Although screening with mammography has been shown to have reduced breast cancer-related mortality through early detection, dense breast tissues reduce mammographic sensitivity, potentially delaying diagnoses, and contributing to poorer outcomes. Therefore, there is a need for more accessible and cost-effective supplemental screening technologies, especially for high-risk populations, especially women with dense breasts. To address these challenges, a promising approach involves combining widely available, cost-effective, and accessible ultrasound-based technologies with economical hardware, software modules, and automated techniques. Among these technologies, Doppler imaging plays a crucial role in the clinical evaluation of breast abnormalities, as intratumoural blood flow has been shown to correlate with the aggressiveness and histological grade of the tumour. The development of a novel automated, portable, and a patient-dedicated 3D automated breast ultrasound (ABUS) system for point-of-care breast cancer supplemental screening holds significant promise. The proposed system has previously demonstrated the capability to generate accurate whole-breast B-mode images, which can aid in the early detection of breast cancer in women with dense breasts. Additionally, it offers the advantage of incorporating Doppler imaging for the assessment of blood flow within suspicious lesions, a capability not commonly available with commercial ABUS systems. By leveraging Doppler imaging in conjunction with 3D Bmode ABUS, this innovative approach could improve breast cancer-related health outcomes and equity in access to healthcare, especially for underserved and vulnerable populations.
High dose-rate brachytherapy is a typical part of the treatment process for cervical cancer. During this procedure, radioactive sources are placed locally to the malignancy using specialized applicators or interstitial needles. To ensure accurate dose delivery and positive patient outcomes, medical imaging is utilized intra-procedurally to ensure precise placement of the applicator. Previously, the fusion of three-dimensional ultrasound images has been investigated as an alternative volumetric imaging technique during cervical brachytherapy treatments. However, the need to manually register the two three-dimensional ultrasound images offline resulted in excessively large registration errors. To overcome this limitation, we have designed and developed a tracked, automated mechatronic system to inherently register three-dimensional ultrasound images in real-time. We perform a system calibration using an external coordinate system transform and validate the system tracking using a commercial optical tracker. The results of both experiments indicated sub-millimeter system accuracy, indicating the superior performance of our device. Future work for this study includes performing phantom validation experiments and translating our device into clinical work.
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