The 42nd Annual International Conference of the IEEE Engineering in Medicine and Biology (EMBC) Society and the 43rd Annual Conference of the Canadian Medical and Biological Engineering Society were held July 20–24, 2020.
With the theme of “Enabling Innovative Technologies for Global Healthcare,” the world’s largest international biomedical engineering conference included the latest developments in biomedical engineering, healthcare technology R&D, translational clinical research, technology transfer and entrepreneurship, and biomedical engineering education.
The meeting included two focused ultrasound presentations. A group from Meiji University studied 3D temperature visualization during treatment, and researchers from Shanghai’s Jiao Tong University fused ultrasound and MRI images for uterine fibroid treatment.
See the abstracts below:
Visualization of 3-D Temperature Distributions Using Ultrasound Images During HIFU Treatments
Ryosuke Sakakibara, Meiji University
Kazuo Kato, Meiji University
Abstract: The ultrasound-guided focused ultrasound surgery (USgFUS) system, which measures temperature distributions inside the heated object, was developed. Ultrasound waves are reflected and scattered because the surface of the human body has a complicated shape. We measured temperature distributions while heating human shaped agar phantoms using ultrasound images before and after heating. From the results, it was confirmed that the proposed system is useful for non-invasively measuring 3-D temperature distributions during HIFU treatments. The high intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) could be applied clinically to treat human cancers. HIFU can induce thermal elevation and lead to ablation and coagulative necrosis for the targeted tissues. It is performed by using a piezoelectric transducer positioned outside the human body. However, as ultrasound waves are reflected between substances having different acoustic impedances, there is a risk of ablating healthy tissues. Here, we measured 3-D temperature distributions near the focal position using ultrasound images before and after heating when heating human shaped agar phantoms.
Fusion of Multiple-Angles Intraoperative US Images and Pretreatment MR Images for USgHIFU Treatment of Uterine Fibroid: Retrospective Evaluation Based on Clinical Dataset
Cong Yang, Shanghai Jiao Tong University
Qianwen Huang, School of Biomedical Engineering, Shanghai Jiao Tong University
Xiang Ji, Shanghai Jiao Tong University
Jingfeng Bai, Shanghai Jiao Tong University
Abstract: High-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) has been widely used for treatment of uterine fibroids. However, due to the limited resolution of ultrasound image in deep organs, the guidance of ultrasound-guided HIFU (USgHIFU) treatment greatly depends on clinicians’ experience in US image. To address this issue, fusion of intraoperative US images and pretreatment MR images has been proposed. Contour segmentation and multiple-angles 2D US images combination are performed to obtain 3D points along the contour of uterus. Iterative closest point (ICP) algorithm based on prior knowledge is used to register these point sets. MR and US images of six treated patients are used for evaluation. The mean distance error (MDE) of our algorithm is 1.71±0.59 mm, and the average running time is 0.18 s. The results have verified the feasibility of fusion of MR images and US images for USgHIFU guidance. In addition, this method may be also potential for post-ablation evaluation with follow-up MR images.