A MEDTECH WEST SEMINAR.
Register before 13:00 December 12 to receive a light lunch: https://regionkalender.vgregion.se/RegionKalender/main.nsf/viewEvents/70C1414CB326E8C6C125807B005160D5?OpenDocument
Speakers: Ylva Lilja, MD PhD, and Oscar Gustafsson, PhD student in MRI physics at Sahlgrenska University Hospital
The visual pathways in the brain are essential for human vision. Injury to the structures leads to visual impairment of different degrees, from milder loss to complete loss of vision. While the anatomy of the visual pathways is well known, they cannot be visualized by conventional medical imaging.
Diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) and tractography are MRI techniques that only recently have been introduced clinically. To this date, clinical applications are primarily preoperative mapping of white matter pathways, including their relation to lesions and the area that is to be resected.
In my doctoral studies I have focused on DTI and tractography of the visual pathways with two clinical purposes
1. To assess the usefulness of intraoperative tractography during surgery in the temporal lobes, with the purpose to reduce postoperative visual impairment
2. To assess DTI as an objective diagnostic tool of injury of the anterior visual pathways, when compressed by tumors, in order to detect and treat early injury.
These two areas are examples of clinical applications of DTI that may lead to improved surgical outcome and better life quality for the patients.
Together with Oscar Gustafsson, MRI physicist and coauthor, Ylva will present her doctoral thesis as an example of clinical applications of DTI and tractography, including the possibilities and challenges of the techniques.