Devices & Diagnostics, Diagnostics, Startups

Robotics used in space enable a ‘one-stop shop’ for breast MRI, biopsy, tissue ablation

The core robotics technology that’s moving equipment, supporting maintenance and docking unpiloted spacecraft at the […]

The core robotics technology that’s moving equipment, supporting maintenance and docking unpiloted spacecraft at the International Space Station is also poised to change how doctors identify and treat breast cancer here on Earth.

A device under development at the Centre for Surgical Invention and Innovation uses robotics to automate the MRI-guided breast biopsy process, improving precision, patient comfort, access and cost efficiency along the way.

The center’s scientific director and CEO, Dr. Mehran Anvari, said the Image-Guided Autonomous Robot (IGAR) is designed for use in women considered high-risk for breast cancer, who are recommended to have a mammogram and MRI annually. The device works with an MRI scanner to bundle an MRI, biopsy and in some cases ablation of a breast lesion into a single procedure.

When a suspicious lesion is identified in a patient through MRI, a radiologist uses the IGAR software to tell the device which path it should insert the biopsy needle so that it reaches the identified breast lesion. Anvari said that in early tests, the device has been able deliver the biopsy needle within 1 mm of the lesion in question.

Automating this process means the precision of the biopsy doesn’t depend on the skill of the particular radiologist doing the procedure. And because most patients are numbed locally, a more precise biopsy could decrease patient discomfort, he added.

It would also allow radiologists to move many biopsy procedures out of the operating room and into the radiation suite.

“Our system sucks out about a centimeter cube of the tissue, so depending on the size of the lesion, you might take it all out” during the biopsy, Anvari said. In the case that a suspicious breast lesion isn’t entirely removed, the final version of IGAR will allow for a needle-based ablation device to be passed back through the same path to destroy the rest, he said. That would hopefully reduce the rate of lumpectomy surgeries needed to be performed later.

Anvari and his team have been working with MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates, the makers of the space robotics technology, to manufacture the device. IGAR is scheduled to begin a clinical trial at the Hopital du Saint-Sacrement in Quebec City, Canada, early next year. If all goes well, Ontario-based CSii plans for commercial release in 2016.

[Image & video credit: CSii]

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