乳腺成像市场争夺战硝烟四起

    1978年，爱德华•弗林博士的第一任妻子在心脏骤停后陷入昏迷，这位核物理学家当时立下誓言：一定要打造一台能够挽救生命的机器。弗林的妻子于18个月后过世，但这段经历却促使他立志要发明一项能够使用磁场映射大脑活动的技术。

    弗林的第二任妻子在53岁时被诊断出患有早期乳腺癌，这时，他已经做好了准备，打算进行第二轮尝试。他之前研制的技术再次被证明是有用的。虽然乳房X线照片已成功地检测出异常细胞，但弗林认为检测和治疗妻子的癌症的程序似乎不够充分。他说：“似乎根本没必要使用放射疗法。这种疗法会在乳房组织上造成大量疤痕，她以后就再也无法进行有效的乳房X线检查了。”

    于是，弗林一头扎进了家里的车库中（他的家在新墨西哥州阿尔伯克基），随后的6个月里，他一直呆在那里，研究出了更好的办法。弗林的目标是，使用磁性纳米粒子开发出一种比典型的乳房X线照片侵害性更小的乳腺癌检测方法。“不幸的是，我在车库里无法获得完成这一设施所需的液体氦，”弗林开玩笑说。于是，他把他的设备搬到了新墨西哥大学健康科学中心（University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center）的一个实验室中。通过与弗林新成立的公司Senior Scientifics合作，这台现在被称为超导量子干涉器（SQUID）的设备终于得以完成。

    弗林并不是第一位意识到数字化乳房X线照相术存在缺陷的人。全美各地的妇女都发现，这个检测过程经常让人感到不适，很容易引发焦虑情绪。为了获得一张清晰的图像，数字化乳腺摄影机通常需要用两个薄板挤压乳房，这是为了让所有的乳腺组织处于同等宽度。有些妇女乳房组织相对而言更丰满紧密，甚至挤压乳房这一行为有时都不足以获得准确的检测结果，还需要采用核磁共振成像（MRI）或超声波等手段进行后续检查。

    医疗器械领域的大型公司正尝试着寻找一种更好的办法。通用电气（General Electric）、飞利浦（Philips）和豪洛捷（Hologic）等公司都在争取价值近60亿美元的医疗成像行业更大的份额，行业分析机构弗若斯特和沙利文公司（Frost & Sullivan）认为，乳腺检查设备是这一领域的重中之重。2011年，美国总计进行了大约4,000万次乳房X线检测，这个市场已经成熟，亟待更出色的医疗技术。成像和数字化乳房X线检测机今年在美国的销售总额为4.25亿美元，预计将维持缓慢但稳健的增长势头（到2015年将增长4%）。

    When his first wife went into a coma following cardiac arrest in 1978, nuclear physicist Dr. Edward Flynn vowed to build a machine that could save lives. Flynn's wife died 18 months later, but the experience moved Flynn to create a technology that could map brain activity using magnetic fields.

    When Flynn's second wife was diagnosed with early stage breast cancer at 53 years old, he was ready for round two. The technology that he'd developed before would prove useful once again. While a mammogram had successfully detected abnormal cells, Flynn says that the procedures to detect and treat his wife's cancer seemed inadequate. "Radiation just didn't seem necessary. It would have caused a lot of scarring on the breast tissue and she would never be able to have another mammogram that worked," he says.

    So Flynn retreated to his garage at his home in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where he spent the next six months building something better. Flynn's aim was to use magnetic nano-particles to develop a less invasive method to detect breast cancer than a typical mammogram. "Unfortunately, I couldn't get liquid helium delivered to my garage to finish the device," Flynn says jokingly. And so he moved his operation to a facility at the University of New Mexico Health Sciences Center, where the device now known as SQUID (superconducting quantum interference device) was finished in partnership with his new business venture Senior Scientifics.

    Flynn is not the first to realize the flaws of digital mammography. Women around the country often find it an uncomfortable and anxiety inducing process. In order to get a clear image, a typical digital mammography machine squeezes the breast between two plates so that all of the breast tissue is of equal width. For women with more or denser breast tissue, even the act of squeezing the breast is sometimes not enough to get an accurate reading, and requires a follow up MRI or ultrasound.

    Major industry is trying to find a better way. General Electric (GE), Philips and Hologic (HOLX) are all striving for bigger pieces of the nearly $6 billion medical imaging industry, much of which is focused on breast screening devices according to industry analyst firm Frost & Sullivan. In 2011, roughly 40 million mammograms were performed in the U.S., making it a prime market for better medical technologies. Sales of film and digital mammography machines in the U.S. totaled $425 million this year and are expected to see a slow but steady overall growth of 4% by 2015.