GE Healthcare Collaborates on Investigational Molecular Breast Imaging System for Early Breast Cancer Detection

GE Healthcare, a unit of General Electric Company (NYSE: GE), announced its collaboration in two clinical trials with the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center in Tel Aviv, Israel and Hamilton Health Sciences Hospital in Ontario, Canada on the use of a novel technology that may assist in assessment and early detection of breast cancer in women who are at high risk for the disease.

GE Healthcare’s investigational Molecular Breast Imaging (MBI) system is a gamma camera dedicated for breast imaging based on accumulation of a radioactive tracer in hypermetabolic cancer cells. The innovation of the MBI technology is the use of imaging detectors, Cadmium Zinc Telluride (CZT), to replace the standard NaI detectors routinely used for gamma cameras, in a dedicated breast device. Extensive early clinical work done in the Mayo Clinic in the U.S. shows encouraging results with the use of MBI technology.

In these two prospective studies, the diagnostic accuracy of MBI will be determined in patients at high risk for breast cancer, including patients with dense breast tissue in whom conventional modalities used for breast, X-ray mammography and ultrasonography, are suboptimal.

“Breast cancer is a foremost health problem for women worldwide and it is growing in numbers,” said Nathan Hermony, GE Healthcare Nuclear Medicine global manager. “Early detection is critical for improving breast cancer survival rates. This technology is intended to improve early detection in women who are at high risk for developing breast cancer, or in women with dense breasts who are less likely to benefit from conventional mammography.”

source: Newswire Today