University of Houston

Breast cancer is today the most common cancer affecting women worldwide, and its incidence is increasing in both developed and developing countries. With the recent advances made in early detection of breast cancer, localized surgical removal of the tumor has been made possible. This process, combined with radiotherapy treatment, is known as breast conserving therapy (BCT). While BCT significantly improves the quality of life of the patient, the cosmetic outcome of the surgery remains subject to various uncertainties for the patient as well as for the surgeon.

The goal of this dissertation is to propose a long-term, patient-specific model of the breast conserving therapy following surgery. We aim to provide a modular and simple tool that can be used in order to assist the surgeon in his decision process prior to the surgery, as well as his discussion with the patient. For this purpose, this multi-scale model combines the different biological and mechanical processes occurring during the healing period and radiotherapy treatment. In this dissertation, we will study in details (i) the biology of wound healing and its complex interplay with the mechanical stress present in the breast, (ii) the mathematical framework used to model the biomechanics of wound healing, (iii) the clinical protocol developed in order to validate and identify the critical parameters of our model.