Digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT) is beginning to be used more frequently alongside full-field digital mammography (DM) in routine breast cancer screening. However, little is known about radiologists’ search strategies reading DBT. This study aims to measure radiologists’ eye movements prior to testing search strategies intended to make DBT faster and/or more accurate. Twelve observers (board certified breast radiologists or current women’s imaging fellows) were instructed to search for lesions as they would report during normal clinical conditions. Observers were shown a single view of a single breast for each case and informed that this was an enriched study (10 positive cases out 20). Eye tracking used a SMI RED250mobile Eye Tracker sampling at 250Hz. Tracking error was below 0.5 deg. There was an increase in the detection rate/accuracy and decrease in false positives with DBT compared to DM. There was a longer search time in DBT compared to DM, with a shorter saccade length shown in DM. Different observers where shown to have differing search patterns however it was not possible to show any observer to have a true driller or scanner technique. Results generally replicated previous studies however; more work would be needed to obtain conclusions as to optimal search strategies.

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Nicholas M. D'Ardenne, Robert M. Nishikawa, Margarita L. Zuley, Chia-Chien Wu, and Jeremy M. Wolfe, "Oculomotor behavior of radiologists reading digital breast tomosynthesis (DBT)," Proc. SPIE 10952, Medical Imaging 2019: Image Perception, Observer Performance, and Technology Assessment, 1095204 (Presented at SPIE Medical Imaging: February 20, 2019; Published: 4 March 2019); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2513602.