Breast positioning system for full field digital mammography and digital breast tomosynthesis system

摘要

This paper will present a new breast positioning system for amorphous selenium (a-Se) based full field digital mammography (FFDM) system, which is also a platform of tomosynthesis prototype. Clinical images demonstrate that this method is capable extending the breast away from the chest wall, and maximizing the breast volume. Breast positioning system consists of two transparent moving sheets that apply traction of the breast controlled by motor. Sheets are under and above the compressed breast. Breast positioning sheets pull the breast into the imaging area during the compression. Digital mammography system is based on amorphous selenium flat panel detector (FPD) technology where the overall thickness of the selenium structure is 200 μm, and the pixel size on this detector is 85 μm. Preliminary results will be presented. Clinical study showed increment of the breast volume imaged, and it brought up to 1.0 cm - 2.0 cm more breast tissue. New breast position system also holds a promise of slight decrement of compression force used in the examination. Maximizing the exposured breast tissue is complicated, but important aspect in the breast cancer detection and diagnosis. Increasing the field of view with an additional volume of breast tissue imaged is a key point in digital mammography and digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT).