LOW-COHERENCE INTERFEROMETRY AND OPTICAL COHERENCE TOMOGRAPHY FOR IMAGE-GUIDED SURGICAL TREATMENT OF SOLID TUMORS

• US 20090221920A1
• Filed: 02/29/2008
• Published: 09/03/2009
• Est. Priority Date: 01/18/2008
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Board of Trustees of The University of Illinois
• Original Assignee: Board of Trustees of The University of Illinois
• Inventors: Nguyen, Freddy T., Boppart, Stephen A., Zysk, Adam M.
• Granted Patent: US 8,983,580 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 600/476
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 2562/0238 Optical sensor arrangements for performing transmission measurements on body tissue
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0066 Optical coherence imaging
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/0073 by tomography, i.e. reconstruction of 3D images from 2D projections A61B5/0066 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/415 the glands, e.g. tonsils, adenoids or thymus
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/418 lymph vessels, ducts or nodes
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/6852 Catheters
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/6853 with a balloon
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/7257 using Fourier transforms

Abstract

A method of forming an image of tissue. The method includes beginning an invasive procedure on a patient exposing tissue. The method then includes acquiring OCT data from the exposed tissue and converting the OCT data into at least one image. The method also includes ending the invasive procedure after the converting of the data.

Claims

1. A method of forming an image of tissue, comprising:

beginning an invasive procedure on a patient exposing tissue;

acquiring OCT data from the exposed tissue;

converting the OCT data into at least one image; and

ending the invasive procedure after the converting of the data.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising performing further data analysis on the image before the ending of the invasive procedure.

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the further data analysis includes enhancing the image.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the invasive procedure is a surgery.

5. The method of claim 2, wherein the further data analysis includes classifying the tissue imaged using the OCT data.

6. The method of claim 5, wherein the OCT data is run through classification algorithms used to classify the tissue imaged.

7. The method of claim 6, wherein the classification algorithms analyze the OCT data and classify the tissue imaged using an optical property which is derived from the OCT data.

8. The method of claim 6, wherein the optical property is one of a refractive index, a scattering profile, a scattering coefficient, an anisotropy factor, birefringence, a spectral shift, texture, a Doppler shift, a phase resolution, a phase-resolved Doppler measurement, a phase-resolved spectroscopic measurement, a light scattering parameter, and spectroscopic absorption.

9. The method of claim 1, wherein the tissue is breast tissue, lung tissue, prostate tissue, colon tissue, brain tissue, thyroid tissue, liver tissue, kidney tissue, skin tissue, or lymph node tissue.

10. A system for imaging tissue in real-time comprising:

a core imaging unit which generates a low-coherence interferometry signal;

a device which is in communication with and receives the low-coherence interferometry signal from the core imaging unit and sends a second signal back to the core imaging unit, wherein OCT data is generated by the core imaging unit; and

a core software unit which receives the OCT data, performs further data analysis, and provides feedback of the OCT data in real-time.

11. The system of claim 10, wherein the further data analysis includes enhancing the image.

12. The system of claim 10, wherein the tissue imaged is classified by running the OCT data through classification algorithms.

13. The system of claim 12, wherein the classification algorithms analyze the OCT data and classify the tissue imaged using an optical property which is derived from the OCT data.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the optical property is a refractive index, a scattering profile, a scattering coefficient, an anisotropy factor, birefringence, spectral shift, texture, Doppler shifts, phase resolution, phase-resolved Doppler measurements, phase-resolved spectroscopic measurements, light scattering parameters, or spectroscopic absorption.

15. A method of analyzing tissue comprising:

beginning an invasive procedure on a patient exposing tissue;

acquiring OCT data from the exposed tissue;

analyzing the OCT data;

classifying the tissue upon analyzing the OCT data; and

ending the invasive procedure after the classifying of the tissue.

16. The method of claim 15 further comprising upon classifying the tissue, determining tumor margins for that tissue.

17. The method of claim 16 further comprising performing further surgical procedures

18. The method of claim 17 further comprising removing tissue if the tumor margins are positive.

19. The method of claim 15, wherein the tissue is lymph node tissue.

20-26. -26. (canceled)

27. A method of removing tissue from a patient comprising:

beginning an invasive procedure on the patient;

exposing tissue to an OCT device;

acquiring OCT data from the exposed tissue;

analyzing the OCT data;

determining tissue margins; and

removing tissue from within the tissue margins from the patient.

28-29. -29. (canceled)