Medical infrared thermographic imaging has been applied in the past to areas such as detection of breast tumours, deep vein thrombosis and lower limb amputation level assessment. In almost all instances problems were encountered which meant that the technique could not be used alone diagnostically without the support of other tests. and has consequently only found a limited number of applications.
In the present study, thermographic images were recorded dynamically during the reheating of skin following cooling to 25ºC. Pixel-by-pixel component analysis of the images was carried out offline in order to construct the functional parametric images. Normal volunteers were investigated using dynamic thermographic imaging of the left volar forearms in under different experimental conditions. In a further pilot study 6 patients with known tumours were studied in order to investigate whether the lesions could be characterised by abnormalities in the parametric images.
The resultant parametric images display information on the heterogeneity of skin blood flow in the areas examined. The heterogeneities observed are very much greater than those obtained with static thermographic images and characteristic patterns appear to emerge under the different experimental conditions. In particular, the early parametric images of breast tumours indicate clear characteristic patterns.
Harrison DK, Cook AIM. Detection of skin blood flow heterogeneity using functional parametric thermographic imaging. Functional Monitoring and Drug-Tissue Interaction, Kessler MD, Müller GJ, (Eds), Proceedings of SPIE Vol. 4623 (2002).
Dr. David K. Harrison, Durham Unit, Durham. Tel: +44 (0)191-333-2215.
Regional Medical Physics Department, Freeman Hospital, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE7 7DN, UK.
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