How Darkroom Photography Techniques Inspired a Radical Approach to Cancer Screening

Tom Ramsay, an image processing expert and master photographer, has spent decades sharing his expertise with the world, from working on satellite imaging for the U.S. Navy, fingerprint image processing for the Department of Homeland Security, computer-based photo microscopy analysis of tuberculosis (TB) in Africa, and even restoring Thomas Edison's movies for the Library of Congress. So when his cousin lost both of her daughters to breast cancer, Ramsay had a hard time understanding how such a thing was possible, given all the advanced imaging technology that exists. The problem, of course, is that even with the most advanced mammography systems, radiologists have a tough time spotting cancer in dense breast tissue because density shows up white in an x-ray and cancer is a density. "So I looked at this as a problem and said 'I think I'm going to approach this very differently.' Because everything I had done in my history ... everything was to write an algorithm in software to find something," Ramsay told MD+DI. "And that makes sense, right? If you're looking for TB you write an algorithm to find TB." But in order to get around the density problem that has confounded the field of breast cancer screening, Ramsay proposed what seems to be a radically different approach. "I said, 'what if we write an algorithm that doesn't find anything?" It sounds counterintuitive, but as a photographer, Ramsay understands the old-school method of ...
Source: MDDI - Category: Medical Devices Authors: Tags: Imaging Source Type: news