Chest radiography CAD system highlights hidden areas

Riverain Medical has added features to its lung cancer computer-aided detection system for chest radiography that are intended to make the program more accurate. The enhancements reduce false positive rates when evaluating solitary lung nodules in regions of interest located in the hilar area and near the ribs.

At the RSNA meeting, the company introduced lateral CAD and rib-over-rib upgrades in a new version of its RapidScreen early cancer detection system, pending FDA premarket approval.

Lateral CAD is designed to focus on the 5% of cases of lung cancer that are missed because they cannot easily be seen on lateral views, according to Kevin E. McBride, vice president of marketing. Both lateral CAD and the rib-over-rib feature aim to reduce the rate of redundant regions of interest that are similar to and may be confused with solitary pulmonary nodules.

The company is also testing a dual energy subtraction CAD system to find suspicious lesions in difficult-to-see areas on chest scans. This capability is a work in progress targeted at the 400 to 500 digital radiography chest systems that are estimated to be on the market, McBride said.