Dynamic infrared imaging for breast cancer diagnosis: a feature based registration approach

An essential, preprocessing step in dynamic infrared imaging applied to breast cancer diagnosis is a proper registration of the thermographic image sequence. The failure to do so may produce artifacts in the FFT power spectra of the temperature sequences due to breast movement which may constitute an important confounding factor potentially invalidating the data analysis. In this work we wish to draw attention to this issue, and show the influence of movement on a case sample of subjects, as well as the correction which may be introduced by realigning the image sequences with four different types of feature-based image registration. The registration process was preventively analyzed in the visible field and then applied to the dynamic thermography images. Results confirm the importance of the registration and encourage further work in the are

Should Endometrial Cancer Treatment Be Centralized?

Endometrial cancer (EC) is the most common malignancy of the female genital tract in Western and emerging countries. In 2012, new cancer cases numbered 319,605, and 76,160 cancer deaths were diagnosed worldwide. ECs are usually diagnosed after menopause; 70% of ECs are diagnosed at an early stage with a favorable prognosis and a 5-year overall survival rate of 77%. On the contrary, women with advanced or recurrent disease have extremely poor outcomes because they show a low response rate to conventional chemotherapy. EC is generally considered easy to treat, although it presents a 5-year mortality of 25%. Though the guidelines (GLs) recommend treatment in specialized centers by physicians specializing in gynecologic oncology, most women are managed by general gynecologists, resulting in differences and discrepancies in clinical management. In this paper we reviewed the literature with the aim of highlighting where the treatment of EC patients requires gynecologic oncologists, as suggested by the GLs. Moreover, we sought to identify the causes of the lack of GL adherence, suggesting useful changes to ensure adequate treatment for all EC patients

Clinical governance network for clinical audit to improve quality in epithelial ovarian cancer management

Background: Epithelial ovarian cancer (EOC) is the most lethal gynecological cancer. Several hospitals throughout the region provide primary treatment for these patients and it is well know that treatment quality is correlated to the hospital that delivers. The aim of this study was to investigate the management and treatment of EOC in a Region of the North Italy (Emilia-Romagna, Italy). Methods. A multidisciplinary group made up of 11 physicians and 3 biostatisticians was formed in 2009 to perform clinical audits in order to identify quality indicators and to develop Region-wide workup in accordance with the principles of evidence-based medicine (EBM). The rationale was that, by setting up an oncogynecology network so as to achieve the best clinical practice, critical points would decrease or even be eliminated. Analysis of cases was based on the review of the medical records. Results: 614 EOC patients treated between 2007 and 2008 were identified. We found only 2 high-volume hospitals (â\u89¥ 21 patients/year), 3 medium-volume hospitals (11-20 operated patients/year), and 7 low-volume hospitals (â\u89¤ 10 operated patients /year). Only 222 patients (76.3%) had a histological diagnosis, FIGO surgical staging was reported only in 206 patients (70.9%) but not all standard surgical procedures were always performed, residual disease were not reported in all patients. No standard number of neoadjuvant chemotherapy cycles was observed. Conclusions: The differences in terms of treatments provided led the multidisciplinary group to identify reference centers, to promote centralization, to ensure uniform and adequate treatment to patients treated in regional centers and to promote a new audit involving all regional hospitals to a complete review of the all the EOC patients. © 2013 Mandato et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd