Abstracto

Computational approaches to assist in the evaluation of cancer treatment response

Mia A Levy and Daniel L Rubin

Cancer treatment-response assessment is an important clinical and research task that utilizes imagebased methods for tracking changes in tumor lesions over time. This article reviews the role of imaging in cancer treatment-response assessment, the limitations of current approaches, and the emerging and future imaging informatics methods to support treatment-response assessment. Imaging informatics methods described include: image repositories for applying and developing response criteria; methods to support the acquisition and storage of image metadata, including ontologies, data standards, image annotation tools and metadata databases; and methods to visualize images and image metadata for treatment decision making. Future directions are discussed, including the development of linked clinical, image and image metadata repositories, and the integration of image metadata into the electronic health record.