Multi-parametric analysis of burn based on dual-detection polarization-sensitive optical coherence tomography

The evaluation of burn degree is a key step to guide the treatment of patients with thermal injury. In this work, multiple parameters including intensity, accumulative and local birefringence features based on dual-detection Polarization Sensitive Optical Coherence Tomography (PS-OCT) are proposed to quantitatively describe the information of skin burn. The results demonstrated that the intensity and the cumulative phase retardation and local phase retardation information of skin decrease with the burn degrees, since thermal damage to the collagen structure of dermal layer. In addition, the slopes of accumulative phase retardation dependent of depth are extracted for characterization of normal and damaged skins. Finally, the local phase retardation not only distinguishes the normal and damaged skin, but also evaluates the burn depth. Therefore, multiple parameters using dual-detection PS-OCT can detect the anisotropic change of birefringence of skin tissue caused by thermal injury and reveal the potential for burn assessment.