Natremed

DITI is used for adjunctive breast disease screening and can enhance early detection of abnormalities.

What is Digital Infra-red Thermal Imaging (DITI) ?

DITI is a screening tool to aid in the early diagnosis / prognosis, evaluation and rehabilitation monitoring of may different conditions. Conditionfs  within clinical fields including rheumatology, neurology, physiotherapy, sports medicine, oncology, paediatrics, orthopaedics and many others.

Unlike most diagnostic modalities DITI is non invasive. It is a very sensitive and reliable means of graphically mapping and displaying skin surface tempreature. With DITI you can diagnose, evaluate, monitor and document a large number of injuries and conditions. I.e soft tissue injuries and sensory / autonomic nerve fibre dysfunction.

Medical DITI can offer considerable financial savings by avoiding the need for more expensive investigation for many patients.

DITI as a Breast Exam

DITI can be used on specific regions of interest (ROI) and offers the opportunity of earlier dection of breast disease than has been possible with breast self examination, physician palpatation, or mammography alone.

DITI is performed using sophisticated medical infra-red cameras, a clinican simply captures infra-red images, or "thermograms" of the breasts. The digitized images are stored on a computer and can be sent electronically to a central database where a physician, such as a Radiologist or Thermologist (thermal imaging specialist), can perform statistical analysis. Significant asymmetries of the breast can indicate a physiological abnormality. This may be pathological (a disease) or it might indicate an anatomical variant. When a therogram is positive, the job of differential diagnosis begins. Reports are colour printed and sent to the patient and their physician / specialist.

<---------- Normal symmerty of healthy breasts

<----------  Inflamed breast disease

DITI detects the subtle physiologic changes that accompany breast pathology, whether it is cancer, fibrocystic disease, an infection or a vascular disease, then the physician can plan accordingly and lay out a careful clinical program to further diagnose and or monitor the patient until other standard testing becomes positive, thus allowing for the earliest possible treatment.

If a suspicious (positive) DITI breast examination is performed, the appropriate follow-up diagnostic and clinical testing can be ordered. This would include mammography and other imaging tests, clinical laboratory procedures, and nutritional and lifestyle evaluation.

All patients thermograms (breast images) are kept on record and form a baselines for all future routine evaluations.

DITI is very sensitive and objective physiological test of abnormalities in the breast and as such is an extremely valuable and important adjunctive test with regard to early detection of breast disease.

<---------- This phlebitis was not detected by other tests. Vascular pain and inflmation can be graphically shown with DITI

<---------- Male breast cancer (DCIS)

Thermography is a physiologic test which demonstrates thermal patterns in skin temperature that may be normal or which may indicate pain, injury, disease or other abnormalities. If abnormal heat patterns are identified relating to a specific region of interest or function, clinical correlation and further investigation may be necessary to assist in diagnosis and treatment.

DITI at Natremed is managed by Julia Miles. You can find more information about Julia in her profile and on her website.