Abstract
Accurate diagnoses of superficial and deep dermal burns are difficult to make even by experienced investigators due to slight differences in dermis damage. Many imaging technologies have been developed to improve the burn depth assessment. But these imaging tools have limitations in deep imaging or resolving ability. Photoacoustic imaging is a hybrid modality combining optical and ultrasound imaging that remains high resolution in deep imaging depth. In this work, we used dual-scale photoacoustic imaging to noninvasively diagnose burn injury and monitor the burn healing. Real-time PACT provided cross-sectional and volumetric images of the burn region. High-resolution PAM allowed for imaging of angiogenesis on the hyperemic ring. A long-term surveillance was also performed to assess the difference between the two damage degrees of burn injuries. Our proposed method suggests an effective tool to diagnose and monitor burn injury.
Highlights
Burns are caused under thermal, electrical, chemical and radioactive threats
There are more than 486,000 burn injuries receiving medical intervention per year in the United States, estimated by the American Burn Association (ABA)
Burns are categorized into epidermal burn, superficial dermal burn (SDB), deep dermal burn (DDB) and deep burn (DB) [2]
Summary
Burns are caused under thermal, electrical, chemical and radioactive threats. There are more than 486,000 burn injuries receiving medical intervention per year in the United States, estimated by the American Burn Association (ABA). Severe skin burn injury can lead to local tissue damage but multiple organ dysfunction syndromes, which urgently demand accurate diagnosis for early burn treatment. Epidermal burn and SDB, as superficial partial burns, can heal spontaneously without surgical therapy, whereas tangential excision and skin grafting are necessary for a majority of DDB and DB treatment. Inaccurate diagnosis might bring improper therapies, resulting in the abuse of medical resources in SDB treatment and the loss of perfect time to cure DDB. Diagnosis of burn depth mainly depends on visual observation or pin-prick tests [3], which are greatly limited by surgeons’ experiences and usually inaccurate. Multiple biopsies are commonly required because of inhomogeneous burn depth in different sites, which causes additional scars and more diagnostic time delay
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