BME.02 – A new way for detecting breast lumps before cancer progression

• Reza Ahmadi
• Sahar Baki
• Joshua Pangilinan
• Lubna Shah
• Lesly Villarreal

In the United States, breast cancer is the most prevalent cancer in women, affecting about 1 in 8 women. Typically, self-breast examinations, clinical breast examinations, and mammograms are the routine detection methods of cancerous tumors. Mammography can be painful and often misses palpable breast masses that could be found through self or clinical breast examinations. However, in self or clinical examinations, clinicians and women have trouble detecting tumors as this skill is enhanced through practice. In addition, tumor detection ability in breast examinations declines as tumor size and hardness decreases. To solve this problem, a realistic physical breast cancer model is needed to teach both patients and new clinicians how to detect tumors in its early stages of breast cancer. To do this, we will create 4 variations of the model, each increasing in tumor detection difficulty. Previous teaching models have not had realistic breast tissue and tumor elasticity. The proposed model will replicate the elasticity of human breast tissue, irregular and smooth tumors, and skin using various grades of a silicone elastomer known as Ecoflex. The elasticity of the materials will be verified through tensile testing of each component. The breast tissue elastic modulus will have a range of 0.5-66 kPa and the skin will be within 200-3000 kPa. The irregular tumors will have a range of 460-558 kPa, and the smooth, spherical tumors will be within 291-307 kPa. We will be verifying these elastic modulus values by using a Chatillon DFS force gauge, where we will clamp our silicone molds and record the force and the displacement to calculate the elastic modulus. By creating these 4 models, patients and doctors will have a better idea of what to expect when performing self or clinical breast examinations, which will assist in detecting tumors in the early stages of cancer.