Preliminary study of optical coherence tomography imaging to identify microscopic extrathyroidal extension in patients with papillary thyroid carcinoma

Abstract

In this preliminary study of a limited series of ex vivo thyroidectomy specimens, we verified the feasibility of OCT as a method of identifying mETE in patients with PTC.

The utility of intra‐operative frozen section for the evaluation of microscopic extrathyroidal extension in papillary thyroid carcinoma

“…There is a limit to detect microscopic ETE using preoperative US because microscopic ETE is only detected by pathologist under the microscope. Recently, some researchers have tried to identify microscopic ETE using intra‐operative frozen biopsy or optical coherence tomography image …”

“…Recently, some researchers have tried to identify microscopic ETE using intra-operative frozen biopsy or optical coherence tomography image. 8,9 In this study, we performed frozen biopsy for intra-operative evaluation of microscopic ETE in patients without ETE revealed by preoperative US. Also, we investigated the clinicopathologic factors in patients with or without microscopic ETE.…”

Optical diagnostic imaging and therapy for thyroid cancer

“…OCT uses a low-energy NIR light source as the detection light and combines a microscope head, a handheld probe, or an endoscope for routine detection in a non-invasive manner without causing damage to biological tissues. Recent research suggests that the OCT technology may evaluate follicle shape and demonstrate thyroid tissue growth patterns [ 35 , 36 ] (as shown in Fig. 1 [ 37 ]), which may also lessen the frequency of fine needle aspirations (FNAs) carried out in benign nodules in multinodular colloid goiter.…”

“…The capacity of OCT to conduct real-time surgical navigation during an operation has also been demonstrated [ 93 , 94 ]. According to research [ 36 ], in ex vivo thyroidectomy specimens of patients who had undergone surgical excision for the therapy of PTC, optical biopsy employing OCT is a viable alternative to frozen sections for the diagnosis of microscopic extrathyroidal extension (mETE). Using a changing axis of laser scanning, OCT can show high-resolution real-time pictures of the tumor and surrounding envelope in this preliminary study [ 36 ].…”

Review of intraoperative optical coherence tomography: technology and applications [Invited]

“…The researchers imaged 112 specimens from 28 patients and determined that OCT could identify positive and negative margins with a diagnostic accuracy of 88%. A different group evaluated the potential of a custom 100 kHz swept-source OCT system for detecting papillary thyroid carcinoma in 170 ex vivo tissue samples resected from 17 patients [200]. The sensitivity and specificity of OCT for detecting extrathyroidal extensions was 82.9% and 87%, respectively.…”