Volpara Health, Seattle, and Mammography Educators LLC, San Diego, have expanded their collaboration to deliver personalized, hands-on mammography training to facilities across the United States and Canada. Using site-specific data gathered by Volpara Analytics software, Mammography Educators will provide one-on-one training for technologists to promote consistent breast positioning techniques.
The companies have been working together since the 2018 integration of Mammography Educators’ training videos into Volpara Analytics, which is software that provides automated and objective assessment of image quality and positioning on every mammogram. According to Volpara, the U.S. FDA attributes poor positioning as the cause of most clinical image deficiencies and most failures of accreditation.
The collaboration is intended to help customers improve image quality, reduce errors, and increase proficiency and efficiency in their clinics. For each site, Mammography Educators will use baseline positioning metrics gathered and analyzed by Volpara Analytics software to customize the hands-on training. Conducting individual sessions with each technologist will help reinforce positive performance and focus on key positioning areas to improve, according to Volpara.
Mammography Educators’ on-site, hands-on mammography positioning trainings help technologists to learn and implement the Miller Method of mammography positioning. The on-site training includes lectures, positioning demonstrations, and hands-on workshops. Breast Imaging Bootcamps will offer a larger group of technologists an educational opportunity that includes both didactic and hands-on learning. The Bootcamps include lectures on breast positioning topics, including “Challenging Patients,” “Additional Views,” and “Mission and Motivation in Mammography.”
“Proper breast positioning is critical for optimal cancer detection, but is difficult to assess objectively,” says Louise Miller, RT(R)(M)(ARRT), CRT, FSBI, FNCBC, director of education and co-founder of Mammography Educators. “We are excited to extend our partnership with Volpara to make hands-on, personalized training sessions available to sites to help address common positioning performance issues that can be routinely identified using Volpara Analytics software.”
Volpara Analytics software provides automated and objective assessment of image quality on every mammogram with a set of clinically validated algorithms that use x-ray physics and artificial intelligence. The TruPGMI algorithm objectively assesses technologists’ patient positioning and resulting image quality and provides technologists with performance feedback.
“This partnership is about putting objective quality data gathered by the [Volpara] Analytics software into action by applying personalized training,” says Kristin Bravo, director of marketing and customer success for Volpara Health. “High quality and motivated staff are key factors for successful breast imaging teams, leading to significant improvement in the quality of mammograms provided to the women they serve.”
