Epithelial ovarian cancer causes the highest mortality of any of the gynecologic cancers although it is the second most common gynecologic malignancy. Ovarian cancer is not usually detected earlier than Stage III or IV because it is usually asymptomatic; yet survival is high with early stage disease. In addition, women with a pelvic mass noted on ultrasound that undergo oophorectomy have only a 1-3% risk of malignancy and thus 97-99% will be overtreated because of our inability to reliably differentiate benign from malignant masses with ultrasound. BRCA1 testing and family history will identify certain high-risk individuals who have a higher risk of malignancy and need a modality that will be more reliable in detecting early cancers to provide more accurate surveillance.We are developing a new transvaginal imaging device optimized for ovarian cancer detection, diagnosis and validated from ex vivo and in vivo clinical studies. This automated system may provide an early diagnostic tool for ovarian cancer in the future.
