Application of Multimodality Imaging Fusion Technology in Diagnosis and Treatment of Malignant Tumors under the Precision Medicine Plan

OBJECTIVE: The arrival of precision medicine plan brings new opportunities and challenges for patients undergoing precision diagnosis and treatment of malignant tumors. With the development of medical imaging, information on different modality imaging can be integrated and comprehensively analyzed by imaging fusion system. This review aimed to update the application of multimodality imaging fusion technology in the precise diagnosis and treatment of malignant tumors under the precision medicine plan. We introduced several multimodality imaging fusion technologies and their application to the diagnosis and treatment of malignant tumors in clinical practice. DATE SOURCES: The data cited in this review were obtained mainly from the PubMed database from 1996 to 2016, using the keywords of “precision medicine”, “fusion imaging”, “multimodality”, and “tumor diagnosis and treatment”. STUDY SELECTION: Original articles, clinical practice, reviews, and other relevant literatures published in English were reviewed. Papers focusing on precision medicine, fusion imaging, multimodality, and tumor diagnosis and treatment were selected. Duplicated papers were excluded. RESULTS: Multimodality imaging fusion technology plays an important role in tumor diagnosis and treatment under the precision medicine plan, such as accurate location, qualitative diagnosis, tumor staging, treatment plan design, and real-time intraoperative monitoring. Multimodality imaging fusion systems could provide more imaging information of tumors from different dimensions and angles, thereby offing strong technical support for the implementation of precision oncology. CONCLUSION: Under the precision medicine plan, personalized treatment of tumors is a distinct possibility. We believe that multimodality imaging fusion technology will find an increasingly wide application in clinical practice.