Quantitative assessment of impedance tomography for temperature measurements in hyperthermia

The objective of this study is a non-invasive assessment of the thermal dose in hyperthermia. Electrical impedance tomography (EIT) has previously been given a first trial as a temperature monitoring method together with microwave-induced hyperthermia treatment, but it has not been thoroughly investigated. In the present work we have examined this method in order to investigate the correlation in vitro between the true spatial temperature distribution and the corresponding measured relative resistivity changes. Different hyperthermia techniques, such as interstitial water tubings, microwave-induced, laser-induced and ferromagnetic seeds have been used. The results show that it is possible to find a correlation between the measured temperature values and the tomographically measured relative resistivity changes in tissue-equivalent phantoms. But the uncertainty of the temperature coefficients, which has been observed, shows that the method has to be improved before it can be applied to clinical in vivo applications.