GE Healthcare's innovation and multi-modality technologies advancing breast cancer care

The MR BREASE (breast spectroscopic examination), a new technique using spectroscopy to improve specificity and a recently launched digital mammography workflow module for GE's Centricity® picture archiving communication system (PACS) system.

Since Senographe's introduction as the world's first full-field digital mammography (FFDM) in 2000, more than 1,800 of the GE systems have been installed worldwide, making it the number one selling digital mammography system in the world.

'GE is the choice of today and the partner of tomorrow for breakthrough advancements in breast imaging,' said David Caumartin, general manager of global Mammography at GE Healthcare. 'Our technologies meet all the clinical needs of screening and diagnostic procedures on one system to optimize workflow, enhancing clinicians' ability to diagnose and treat breast cancer.'

The Most Advanced Multi-Modality Technologies for Breast Care Mammography
Introduced in early 2004, the Senographe DS was the first and only full-field digital mammography system designed to meet all clinical needs, from screening to diagnostic and interventional procedures, using the same detector to optimize image quality and workflow. Senographe DS and Seno Advantage 2 multi-modality breast imaging workstation are cornerstones of GE's digital mammography offering.

GE is one of the only manufacturers in the industry today that provides the entire mammography imaging chain from tube, detector to review workstation, and integrates comprehensive customer needs into our roadmap for the future.

Breast Magnetic Resonance (MR)
With its high sensitivity, MR is a rapidly growing modality in breast imaging. It is being used as an imaging tool for high-risk patients and as a problem-solving tool for patients with dense breasts and indeterminate mammograms. It is also used to define the extent of disease by looking at chemical makeup with breast spectroscopy.

New MR techniques are emerging that may further improve the specificity of breast MRI such as GE's new breakthrough MR application BREASE. GE's MR BREASE improves the ability to distinguish benign breast lesions from cancerous ones by showing elevated concentrations of choline, a product of membrane synthesis that rises in rapidly reproducing cancer cells and is a strong indicator of malignancy. BREASE potentially reduces the number of benign biopsies indicated by MR, according to researches conducted independently.

GE's MR BREASE is a new enhancement to the company's VIBRANT (volume imaging for breast assessment) high definition technology that enables a non-invasive imaging procedure of both breasts simultaneously, in a single patient visit. VIBRANT -XV further expands the capability to acquire high-resolution images at high speed, providing both exquisite anatomical detail as well as critical kinetic information. GE has more than 1,200 VIBRANT installations worldwide.

Through GE's collaboration with Confirma, the market leader for computer-aided-detection (CAD) for breast MR, GE distributes CADstream technology to MR customers worldwide. CADstream enhances the clinical efficacy of breast MR studies by highlighting and color-coding areas indicative of breast cancer for further review and automatically correcting MR images for patient movement. Working together, VIBRANT and CADstream can reduce processing and interpretation time to a maximum of 10 minutes, while helping to improve the quality of breast MRI programs.

Breast Ultrasound
Ultrasound has become a standard and important tool in the detection and diagnosis of breast cancer. Of the 1.6 million women who will have breast biopsies this year, more than 500,000 will undergo the invasive, open surgical procedure.

GE is now delivering a new age of ultrasound technology called volume ultrasound by combining the industry's most advanced system platforms, (LOQIQ and Voluson) multi-dimensional image applications and new 4-D and Matrix array technologies. Volume ultrasound will allow physicians to explore patient images in any plane, reveal the smallest details and acquire and construct volumetric images in real-time with stunning clarity.

Breast Cancer Information Management
GE has also integrated a new digital mammography workflow module to its Centricity® PACS product that offers customers the ability to read digital mammography images on their PACS workstation while providing efficient access to historical multi-modality exams. These advanced applications are aimed to facilitate the earliest detection of breast cancer, giving a woman the best potential clinical outcome through early treatment.

Immediate access to current and historical patient information is critical in cancer care. Patient information systems allow physicians to have accurate and timely information about a patient at their fingertips, rather than waiting days or hours. GE Centricity is used in top cancer centers worldwide; this award-winning GE information system enables clinicians to electronically track and confirm the medications that patients receive, avoiding preventable adverse drug events and other issues.

Oslo Study With Digital Mammography* (see note to editor)
New research shows that digital mammography detects significantly more breast cancers earlier than the conventional film based systems. The research indicates that in a group of 500,000 women screened for breast cancer, about 1500 additional cancers would potentially be detected earlier using digital mammography compared with conventional x-ray film-based technology.

The findings are the result of a large scale clinical study carried out in Norway, led by Professor Per Skaane of the Breast Imaging Centre, Ullevaal University Hospital, Oslo. The study involved a population of approximately 25,000 women and compared the cancer detection rates of digital and film mammography in breast screening.

Professor Skaane, lead investigator of the study said 'The results of this large scale clinical study show that digital mammography offers a clear advantage in the early detection of breast cancer over conventional film based systems.' He added: 'Early detection of cancer offers the opportunity to treat cancers earlier in their development with less aggressive treatments.'

The digital system used in the trial was the GE Senographe™ 2000D, developed by GE Healthcare in France. Caumartin added: 'Conventional film based detection is a very powerful technique, but in addition digital mammography offers so many advantages to women and clinicians. These include superior detection rates, reduced radiation exposure, fewer recalls, quicker, more patient centered examinations, and the ability of clinicians to share and review images remotely, which offers the promise of greater efficiency. Digital mammography will, in the near future, allow even more advanced applications such as 3-D breast imaging and imaging fusion, which shows great promise in the detection of cancer.'