Visual perception is a vital component of the diagnostic imaging chain. Errors in perception (false negatives and false positives) can have a negative impact on patient diagnosis and care. Increased experimental and theoretical and theoretical understanding of human visual capabilities and limitations will provide a stronger basis for the analysis of potential benefits of changes to data acquisition, image reconstruction, image compression and display methods in medical imaging. The Far West Image Perception Conference has been held every two years since 1985, and is devoted to the presentation of ideas and papers relevant to medical image perception. The conference brings together a unique group of participants interested in improving the detection of cancer and other abnormalities, who all use or rely on aspects of biomedical engineering to conduct their work. In 1999 the 8th Far West Conference will be hosted by the Radiology Department, Brigham & Women's Hospital and will be held at Morley, Alberta, May 28-30. There has been some concern about the lack of diversity in previous Far West conferences. We are specifically attempting to attract more participants in the 1999 conferences from MRI, Nuclear Medicine and Ultrasound as well as to encourage more participation by industrial scientists and engineers. In order to encourage this change, scientists in these underrepresented subspecialties have been specifically recruited to serve on the 199 conference organizing committee. Far West is classified as a domestic scientific meeting since most participants come from the US or Canada with a small additional contingent from Britain. Conference topics will include: development and evaluation and evaluation of methods of observer performance studies and objective device evaluation, engineering and ergonomic issues related to displaying and interpreting medical images with emphasis on digital image display, development of systems and devices for long-distance radiology (teleradiology) and development and evaluation of observer models that are able to include background and anatomical structure effects. We anticipate 50 to 75 attendees with approximately 35 scientific papers being presented. This grant will be used to provide financial support for about 9 graduate students and residents who wish to present research papers. The goal is to encourage young investigators (particularly women and minorities) to develop interest and skills in this important research areas. There were a total of 9 scholarships awarded for the 1997 Far West conference.
