Newswise — The White House statement this Wednesday on the Cancer Moonshot announced the official launch of the first Coding4Cancer (C4C) Challenge. Called the “Digital Mammography DREAM Challenge,” this $1.2 million prize competition is challenging coders to improve the accuracy of digital-image breast cancer detection in order to improve patient outcomes and reduce healthcare costs.

Christoph Lee, MD, a clinical advisor for the nationwide challenge, is a radiologist at Seattle Cancer Care Alliance specializing in breast cancer. He and other leaders created the challenge, which provides coders with over 640,000 digital mammography images and a set of metadata, including demographics, family medical history, and clinical data about the images.

Breast cancer is the most frequently diagnosed solid cancer and second leading cause of cancer death among U.S. women and mammography is known to catch breast cancer earlier and help save lives. Despite this benefit, routine mammography is associated with a high risk of false positive testing and may lead to overdiagnosis of clinically insignificant lesions. Out of every 1,000 women screened, only 5 will have breast cancer. Yet 100 will be recalled for further testing. This challenge aims to close that gap.

Dr. Lee is available for interviews. Please email [email protected] to arrange.

His bio: http://www.seattlecca.org/doctor/christoph-lee.cfm