Business & Tech

La Mesa Inventor's Home Breast Exam Device May Help Detect Cancer

Eclipse Breast Health Technologies founder Ken Wright lives in La Mesa. His company hopes to raise $650,000 in the next 37 days in order to put the Eclipse on the market by the end of 2014.

A fundraising campaign has started to put a device in the hands of thousands of women that can detect abnormalities in breast tissue and improve self exams for breast cancer.

La Mesa-based Eclipse Breast Health Technologies was started by Ken Wright, whose background is in imaging technology. Sensors inside the handheld wireless device called Eclipse are three to five times more sensitive than the human hand, the company said. The device records images taken during self breast exams to an iPad or wireless device.

Eclipse cannot be relied upon to diagnose breast cancer but abnormalities detected in breast tissue may prompt a woman to seek a mammogram and additional medical attention. 

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To do clinical testing with 1,000-10,000 women to document the device's effectiveness, receive FDA approval and attempt to get the device on the market by the end of 2014, the company wants to raise $650,000 over the next 37 days.

Wright helped create technology for the Navy to record images in murky waters, said Karen Sohl with Eclipse.

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"Eclipse started in 2010 but Ken's been working on this technology for 15 or 20 years because it all evolves from the technology he helped work on with the Navy," she said.

The device will incorporate Pink Cloud, a support system that offers professional advice on the results of images taken by the Eclipse.

"There hasn’t been anything like this for breast health which gives me as a physician quantifiable data to be more objective while also adding to better patient interaction," said Dr. Han Chiu with the Stanford School of Medicine.

Eclipse Breast Health Technologies is currently seeking partners or supporters within the public health and anti-breast cancer community, Sohl said.


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