PHYSICAL SCIENCES INC. — Department of Health and Human Services SBIR Phase I: Y

Description

Project Summary AbstractThere is a constant need in the voice clinic to make effective diagnosticsurgicaland therapeutic decisions based on coupling visual judgments of vocal fold morphology and tissue motion with auditory perceptions of voice qualityCurrentlylaryngologists and speech language pathologists do not have an endoscopic imaging tool that can directly capture the three dimensionalDsurface motion of the vocal folds in real time as patients phonateTo address this needPhysical SciencesIncPSIin collaboration with the Center for Laryngeal Surgery and Voice Rehabilitation at Massachusetts General Hospitalproposes to develop a novel laryngeal imaging technique that combines swept source optical coherence tomography with videostroboscopy to provide aD view of the vocal folds in real time during phonationas well as tissue subsurface morphologyA novel OCT imaging approachcalled parallel OCTPOCTwill be used to enable simultaneous interrogation of multiple locations along the vocal foldsThis new imaging mode eliminates motion blur artifacts exhibited by the sequential sampling provided by conventional flying spot OCTThese state of the art OCT techniques rely on raster scanning that lacks spatial co registration and suffers from temporal aliasing when imaging rapidly moving targets such as the vibrating vocal foldsDuring this effortPSI will build a clinically viable transoral endoscope that will integrate POCT and video imagingThe proposed POCT videostroboscopy technique will be the first attempt to develop an ultra fast diagnostic tool that performs superior inferior surface and subsurface depth sampling synchronized with the clinical standard of laryngeal videostroboscopyIn Phase Iinstrumental specifications will be validated on the bench using aerodynamically driven excised larynx models to simulate voice productionwith subsequent in vivo clinical testing planned in Phase IIBased on experience with the Phase I prototypea second generation parallel OCT videostroboscopy system will be developed in Phase II to evaluate individuals with and without voice disordersThe new technology will enable cost effective management of patients to pinpoint problems affecting an individualandapos s vocal mechanism and to more optimally assess the efficacy of treatment before and after surgical intervention and or voice therapy Project NarrativeThe main focus of this project is to develop a novel three dimensional clinical imaging system that will combine parallel optical coherence tomography and videostroboscopy to assess the vocal fold surface and subsurface during phonationThe integration of these technologies into a cost effectivecommon path transoral endoscope will result in improved assessment of voice disorders and will positively impact patient outcomes