the health strategy
journal
health management, engineering
and technology
Joaquim Cardoso MSc.
Chief Research and Strategy Officer (CRSO);
Chief Editor and Senior Advisor
July 31, 2023
What is the message?
Early detection of breast cancer through a wearable ultrasound device can significantly improve survival rates.”
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Breast cancer, when detected at early stages, boasts a survival rate of nearly 100 percent, while the rate drastically drops to about 25 percent for later-stage diagnoses.
To address this significant difference in survival rates, MIT researchers have developed a groundbreaking wearable ultrasound device aimed at enabling individuals to detect breast tumors in their early stages.
The device, a flexible patch that attaches to a bra, incorporates a miniaturized ultrasound scanner using innovative piezoelectric material, allowing users to perform imaging at any time without special expertise.
Inspired by the tragic experience of her late aunt’s late-stage breast cancer diagnosis, …
… Professor Canan Dagdeviren designed the diagnostic device to provide more frequent screenings for individuals at high risk of breast cancer, particularly targeting interval cancers that develop between routine mammograms.
These interval cancers account for 20 to 30 percent of all breast cancer cases and tend to be more aggressive than those detected during regular scans.
The wearable ultrasound patch offers a fundamental capability in the early detection and diagnosis of breast cancer, potentially increasing the survival rate to as high as 98 percent.
The device was successfully tested on a human subject, detecting breast cysts as small as 0.3 centimeters in diameter, equivalent to early-stage tumors.
The researchers demonstrated that the device achieved resolution comparable to traditional ultrasound, with the ability to image tissue up to a depth of 8 centimeters.
Currently, the ultrasound images from the wearable patch require connection to a traditional ultrasound machine for viewing.
However, the researchers are working on a miniaturized imaging system, aiming to reduce its size to that of a smartphone.
This breakthrough technology provides a more reliable, comfortable, and less intimidating diagnostic tool, removing barriers for early breast cancer detection and making it accessible for those at high risk or with limited access to screening facilities.
The team envisions this wearable ultrasound patch as a transformative tool for breast cancer detection, potentially used at home for frequent screening of high-risk individuals or to diagnose cancer in populations with limited screening access.
As a reusable and portable device, it promises to revolutionize breast cancer diagnostics and significantly advance ultrasound research and medical device designs.
Future plans include integrating artificial intelligence to analyze image changes over time and exploring adaptations of the ultrasound technology for scanning other body parts.
Names mentioned
- Professor Canan Dagdeviren
- The research was funded, in part, by the National Science Foundation, a 3M Non-Tenured Faculty Award, the Sagol Weizmann-MIT Bridge Program, and MIT Media Lab Consortium Funding.
This is an Executive Summary of the article “A wearable ultrasound scanner could detect breast cancer earlier”, Originally published at https://news.mit.edu on July 28, 2023, authored by Anne Trafton.
