Improving Early Detection & Triage for Oesophageal Cancer with Low-Cost Capsule Endoscopy

食管癌的5年生存率为15%。这一数据之所以如此之低，是因为早期食道癌很难被发现。目前检测食管癌的方法是通过白光内窥镜和随机区域的生物间谍，这可能非常昂贵。因此，大规模放映不是一种选择。这个项目的目的是生产一种低成本的药丸大小的胶囊内窥镜，病人可以吞下它来拍摄食管的高级图像，以筛查食管癌的迹象。该设备的第二个应用是用于医院分诊，以检测上消化道的血液或阻塞。该项目的目标是开发一种低成本的胶囊内窥镜原型，用于对食道进行成像并检测癌组织。希望通过QMC的合作者对离体组织样本进行成像，以进一步开发该设备以实现其临床翻译。

Oesophageal cancer has a five year survival rate of 15%. This statistic is so low because early stage cancer in the oesophagus is difficult to detect. The current way of detecting oesophageal cancer is via white light endoscopy and taking biospies of random areas, which can be quiet costly. Therefore, large scale screenings are not an option. The aim of this project is to produce a low cost, pill sized capsule endoscope that can be swallowed by the patient to take advanced images of the oesophagus to screen for signs of oesophageal cancer.A second application of this device is for it to be used in hospital triage to detect blood or blockages in the upper gastrointestinal tract. The goal of this project is to develop a prototype capsule endoscope, at a low cost, to image the oesophagus and detect cancerous tissue. It is desired to image samples of ex-vivo tissue via collaborators at QMC to further develop this device towards its clinical translation.