Title: Facilitating multi-disciplinary, knowledge-based support for breast cancer screening

Authors: Srinandan Dasmahapatra, David Dupplaw, Bo Hu, Paul Lewis, Nigel Shadbolt, Hugh Lewis

Addresses: Intelligence Agents, Multimedia Group (IAM), School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK. ' Intelligence Agents, Multimedia Group (IAM), School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK. ' Intelligence Agents, Multimedia Group (IAM), School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK. ' Intelligence Agents, Multimedia Group (IAM), School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK. ' Intelligence Agents, Multimedia Group (IAM), School of Electronics and Computer Science, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, UK. ' School of Engineering, University of Southampton, Southampton, SO17 1BJ, UK

Abstract: In order to increase the accuracy of breast cancer screening, the diagnostics of imaging modalities (X-ray, ultrasound or magnetic resonance (MR)) is assessed alongside results of histopathological or cytopathological studies as well as clinical information about a patient. This procedure is called |triple assessment| in the UK. We have undertaken a project to develop a multiple ontology-based medical image-annotation and reasoning system to support this procedure. Our system integrates image-annotation tools for drawing, image analysis and feature extraction, with ontologies compliant with the proposed language standard, namely OWL. This integration is carried out by the mapping between images and instances in the ontologies. In this paper, we outline the ambit of the project in further detail and discuss some of the architecture and design issues that we have resolved in order to make our system modular and semantic web-enabled. The resulting knowledge base should not only support medical practitioners in the triple assessment process but also provide a resource from which personalised patient information could be delivered via the web direct to patient or care provider. Finally, we describe the progress that we have made thus far on the implementation of this system.

Keywords: triple assessment; breast cancer screening; ontologies; medical image annotation; virtual primary healthcare; healthcare technology; imaging modalities; X-ray; ultrasound; magnetic resonance; patient information; diagnostics; histopathological studies; cytopathological studies; image analysis; feature extraction; semantic web; knowledge based systems; KBS; e-healthcare; electronic healthcare.

DOI: 10.1504/IJHTM.2006.008428

International Journal of Healthcare Technology and Management, 2006 Vol.7 No.5, pp.403 - 420

Published online: 20 Dec 2005 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article