Beaumont Hospital in Dearborn is one of eight centers nationwide participating in research to improve the detection of breast cancer in women by using SoftVue three-dimensional ultrasound technology on women with dense breast tissue.
The trial has a goal of testing 10,000 women nationwide, with about 2,000 women undergoing treatment at Beaumont Hospital.
“Dense breast tissue occurs in more than 40 percent of women and there are no telling markers as to why some women have denser breast tissue than others,” says Dr. Sophia Roumanis, radiologist and principal investigator at Beaumont Hospital. “If proven successful, this ultrasound technology will allow women with dense breast tissue to have a more accurate reading that will hopefully allow for earlier and better detection of cancerous lumps.”
SoftVue, which was developed by Delphinus Medical Technologies Inc. in Novi, is a fully automated system that conducts scans while a woman lays face down with her breasts supported in warm water. A 360-degree ring transducer images the entire breast in a single pass, moving from the front end of the breast to the chest wall, without the radiation and compression associated with mammography and other imaging systems.
The circular transducer can evaluate multiple distinctive tissue qualities to provide physicians with a more comprehensive view. The exam lasts two to four minutes and the captured signals are the analyzed using algorithms that provide cross-sectional slices of the breast’s entire volume of tissue.
Qualified research participants wil have both screening mammography and SoftVue exams, and imaging information gathered from the project will compare software to traditional imaging technology to measure its effectiveness for cancer detection. Women interested in participating in the clinical trial can call 313-593-8090 or click here.
