Cognition and Medical Image Perception Think Tank

Rockville, Maryland

Medical image interpretation is central to the detection and diagnosis of many cancers. In an era of unprecedented technological advances in medical imaging and machine learning, it is critically important to understand the cognitive and perceptual functioning of the “human in the loop,” medical image specialists (e.g., radiologists, pathologists) who make the final decisions on cancer detection and diagnosis. However, medical image perception is a chronically understudied area of research.

The Cognition and Medical Image Perception Think Tank brought radiologists and pathologists together with researchers working in medical image perception and adjacent fields of cognition and perception, to identify opportunities to advance the study of medical image interpretation through constructive discourse, idea generation, and problem-solving.

Objectives:

1. Identify research gaps and critical unsolved problems in pathology and radiology, from the perspective of clinicians.
2. Discuss ways to address these clinically informed questions through cognitive and perceptual research.
3. Identify barriers that hinder collaborations between researchers and clinicians and identify potential solutions.
4. Identify and discuss ways to elevate psychology’s profile within the medical image community.
5. Pinpoint resources needed to facilitate transdisciplinary research.
6. Identify future goals and identify strategies to evaluate progress.

White Paper: Treviño M, Birdsong G, Carrigan A, et al. Advancing Research on Medical Image Perception by Strengthening Multidisciplinary Collaboration. JNCI Cancer Spectrum 2021 doi:10.1093/jncics/pkab099.

Contact Information

Please send questions to Todd Horowitz at todd.horowitz@nih.gov