e-Prolipsis: A web based risk estimation platform to support and register breast cancer diagnosis in Greece

Breast cancer diagnosis requires specific expertise from the Medical Doctors. Furthermore, prognosis, monitoring and early detection of malignant findings can be successfully realized through synergies between physicians, researchers and general population in concert with the health policy program of each country. Information technology and computational intelligence play a crucial role in the production of digital repositories and cancer registries as well as in the development of systems to support diagnosis. In this paper we present the concept and the architecture of an approved grant under the National Strategic Reference Framework 2007-2013 (NSRF), called e-Prolipsis. Through this project, we will design and implement a web based risk estimation platform and a Central Breast Cancer Registry (CBCR) that will co-operate to provide medical doctors and patients with services such as multiplicity in diagnostic opinions, synergy, computational risk estimation, access to statistical/epidemiological data for trend estimation. Such a system, will serve as a reference tool and will help the clinician, the radiologist, the rural doctor or trainee doctor in the final assessment on the existence or likelihood of breast cancer. The system will assist in the successful diagnosis of breast cancer, giving each patient access to a large pool of doctors and at the same time, the data stored in the CBCR will be used for statistical analysis, providing useful results for improving both the cancer detection application and for making a national policy for combating breast cancer. This system will be accessible through a Web Portal, with different access levels for patients, doctors and general public and different web services available to each user group, eliminating the geographical distances that would be imposed otherwise.