DEVICE FOR ANALYZING THERMAL DATA BASED ON BREAST SURFACE TEMPERATURE FOR THE DETECTION FOR USE IN DETERMINING CANCEROUS CONDITIONS

• US 20100056944A1
• Filed: 08/27/2008
• Published: 03/04/2010
• Est. Priority Date: 08/27/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Cyrcadia, Inc.
• Original Assignee: Lifeline Biotechnologies, Inc.
• Inventors: Keith, Louis G., Reeves, William H., Holmes, Jimmy D.
• Granted Patent: US 8,185,485 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 600/549
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/015 By temperature mapping of body part
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7267 involving training the classification device
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/743 Displaying an image simultaneously with additional graphical information, e.g. symbols, charts, function plots
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 50/20 for computer-aided diagnosis, e.g. based on medical expert systems
• CPC Class Codes: G16Z 99/00 Subject matter not provided for in other main groups of this subclass

Abstract

A device for providing improved classification of breast tissue wherein the tissue is classified as one of cancerous and non-cancerous tissue includes sensors for sensing temperature of a subject breast tissue over a predetermined period and generating signals in response thereto and a computer operatively connected to the sensors for receiving and manipulating the signals operatively associated with a normalizer for applying a normalization to each the signal by a function of X/Y where X is one temperature reading of one of the signals for a particular subject and Y is the maximum temperature obtained from a predetermined number sets of temperature readings obtained a plurality of subject breast tissue from the subject to provide a set of normalized signals used by a trained artificial classifier to produce a signal indicative of cancerous and non-cancerous tissue of the subject.

Claims

1. A device for providing improved classification of breast tissue wherein the tissue:

is classified as one of cancerous and non-cancerous tissue, which comprises;

means for sensing temperature of a subject breast tissue over a predetermined period and generating signals in response thereto;

means operatively associated with said means for sensing for receiving and manipulating said signals employing a computer based device operatively associated with means for applying a normalization to each said signal, said normalization including a function of X/Y where X is one temperature reading of one of said signals for a particular subject and Y is the maximum temperature obtained from a predetermined number sets of temperature readings obtained a plurality of subject breast tissue from said subject, said normalization to provide a set of normalized signals and said computer based device operatively associated with a trained artificial classifier and wherein said set normalized signals are input through said trained artificial classifier to produce a signal indicative of cancerous and non-cancerous tissue of the subject.

2. The device for providing improved classification of breast tissue of claim 1, wherein said computer based device is operatively associated with a plurality of trained artificial classifiers and wherein said set normalized signals are input through said trained artificial classifiers to produce signals indicative of cancerous and non-cancerous tissue of the subject.

3. The device for providing improved classification of breast tissue of claim 1, wherein said classifier is further trained using said normalized signals.

4. The device for providing improved classification of breast tissue of claim 2, wherein said classifiers are selected from a group of Back-Propagation, Radial Basis Function, Gaussian Mixture Model, Fuzzy Network and Support Vector Machine.

5. A method for providing improved classification of breast tissue wherein the tissue is classified as one of cancerous and non-cancerous tissue, which comprises:

(a) sensing temperature of a subject breast tissue over a predetermined period and generating signals in response thereto;

(b) employing a computer based device having means for receiving and manipulating said signals, applying a normalization to each said signal, said normalization including a function of X/Y where X is one temperature reading of a given set of readings for a particular subject and Y is the maximum temperature obtained from a predetermined number sets of temperature readings obtained a plurality of subject breast tissue from said subject, said normalization to provide a set of normalized signals and said computer based device operatively associated with a trained artificial classifier and wherein said set normalized signals are input through said trained artificial classifier to produce a signal indicative of cancerous and non-cancerous tissue of the subject.

6. The method for providing improved classification of breast tissue of claim 5, wherein said computer based device is operatively associated with a plurality of trained artificial classifiers and wherein said set normalized signals are input through said trained artificial classifiers to produce signals indicative of cancerous and non-cancerous tissue of the subject.

7. The method for providing improved classification of breast tissue of claim 5, wherein said classifier is further trained using said normalized signals.

8. The method for providing improved classification of breast tissue of claim 6, wherein said classifiers are selected from a group of Back-Propagation, Radial Basis Function, Gaussian Mixture Model, Fuzzy Network and Support Vector Machine.