The Role of Pathological Analyses in Monitoring Treatment Effectiveness

Pathological analysis is a basic requirement in modern oncology, orthopaedics, trauma surgery, etc. for the diagnosis and monitoring of disease-related complications. Early and accurate determination of the pathological features of a disease such as cancer or of a trauma is crucial first for correct diagnosis. Moreover, pathological analyses play an essential role in planning and monitoring the success of treatments such as medical cancer therapies and the placement and follow-up of prostheses. Surgical treatment in traumatology includes the therapy of single injuries such as fractures of bones, ligamentous rupture, or dislocation of joints. However, surgical intervention is life threatening and expensive and comes with the risk of infections and functional sequelae. Therefore a precise therapy planning taking into account the whole clinical history of the patient including the pathological background is necessary for high success rates. The success of the treatment is highly determined by the time between trauma and therapy, the quality of the operation (position of prosthesis) and the rehabilitation (early mobilisation) [1]. Regular postoperative controls by x-ray imaging are carried out to monitor the success of the operation. This paper introduces 3D ultrasound imaging as an alternative or complementary modality with less exposition of the patient for therapy planning and followup care. Pathological analyses are obligatory to determine postoperative irregularities as early as possible to minimize the costs for health insurance from complications. Many times, pathological analyses including surgery and x-ray imaging are ambiguous for the interpretation. Accurate spatial models obtained from raw tomographic data can assist the practitioner in risk assessment. About a quarter of cancer deaths is caused by metastases, the spreading of tumor cells from the primary tumor to distant organs. Hematogenous metastases are of special interest as they are responsible for malignancies in the liver, lung and bone. Modeling the blood transport of tumor cells can help to understand and to prevent the onset of secondary tumors [2].