Reduce the time of evaluation of mammographic images in tomosynthesis and increase the confidence of radiologists in the daily use of 3D technology in both clinical and screening: this is the purpose of TomoNav, an innovative tool for navigation guided images of the software platform born from the collaboration between the Integrated Diagnostic Activities Department of Imaging of the Integrated University Health Authority of Trieste (ASUITs), Advanced Technologies TA Srl, specialized in innovative medical technologies in the field of medical physics, radiotherapy and radiological diagnostics, and DataMind Srl, active in image analysis especially in the medical field.

Both companies are based in Friuli Innovazione, a business accelerator with a ten-year experience in technological transfer actions and dissemination of the entrepreneurial culture and innovation, which also followed the project coordination, dissemination and dissemination of the project results " Platform for the analysis and comparison of images of breast tomosynthesis ".
DataMind is the first startup founded in the Friuli Innovazione business incubator in 2006 and the close collaboration with Tecnologie Avanzate was established thanks to the networking action carried out by Friuli Innovazione within the scientific and technological park.

In 2016 ASUITs acquired a new mammograph with the tomosynthesis module, which represents a 3D technological evolution of digital mammography with the aim of overcoming the intrinsic limits of the 2D mammographic image. The wealth of information provided by tomosynthesis involves, however, a significant increase in the time of analysis of images, an aspect that is perceived as a real limitation in the applicability of tomosynthesis. The operation of evaluation of mammograms in tomosynthesis becomes even more burdensome when the radiologist needs to compare images in different projections or images acquired at different times to obtain a more complete diagnosis.

The idea arises from the consideration that currently there are no specific software platforms to correlate multiple tomosynthesis images. Existing technologies allow only the parallel display of volumes and the navigation of a single volume at a time.
The platform created by DataMind, Tecnologie Avanzate and ASUITs is instead able to manage multiple 3D images at the same time, to display them with optimized modes to the intended application and to provide an automatic synchronization of positions between two images, in order to facilitate simultaneous browsing. All this thanks to the use of image recording methods that take into account non-negligible deformations of the breasts that occur between two acquisitions.

The project was co-financed by the Friuli Venezia Giulia Region under the POR FESR 2014-2020.

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