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Researchers at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston are exploring novel ways of integrating
the latest in imaging tools with therapeutic approaches. Their clinical platform for this
integration is the AMIGO operating suite. AMIGO is an acronym which stands for “Advanced
Multidisciplinary Image Guided Operating suite.” It’s a 5700 square foot theater that includes
PET/CT, computer assisted fluoroscopy, 3T MRI, 3D ultrasound as well as advanced navigational,
robotics, and drug delivery tools. The central theme in AMIGO is to provide the safest, and
least invasive and most importantly the most effective treatment for patients.
Image guided therapy has three components. Imaging, and we are using advanced imaging
modalities, and multiple modalities.
The second is guidance which is mostly based on computerized navigation tools and finally
therapy which is a combination and integration of therapy delivery systems with imaging and
image guidance systems. So practically what we are working on is a
major integration of these three components and applying them for a given clinical application.
The center grant was established with multiple cores that support both the clinical programs
in neurosurgery and prostate cancer and focused ultrasound surgery but now also have cores
in navigation, image guided computer registration and the sort of computational core as we call
it and some of the much more fundamental basic research that goes into the registration segmentation
of image data before, during and after a procedure so that the operator can integrate in their
minds all of the modalities.
We also hope and anticipate that we will develop new procedures based upon multimodality image
guidance which will change the current practice of surgery, interventional radiology and will
show that the direction is to improve the role of advanced imagine in procedures and
significantly improve the success of these procedures.