Time-resolved fluorescence (TRF) and diffuse reflectance spectroscopy (DRS) for margin analysis in breast cancer

Area of Science:

• Biomedical Optics
• Surgical Oncology
• Medical Instrumentation

Background:

• Accurate surgical margin assessment is critical for effective breast cancer treatment.
• Current methods can be time-consuming and may require multiple procedures.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop instrumentation capable of differentiating between tumor and normal breast tissue in real-time during surgery.
• To establish the feasibility of using time-resolved fluorescence and reflectance spectroscopy (tr-FRS) for intraoperative margin assessment.

Main Methods:

• A time-resolved fluorescence and reflectance spectroscopy (tr-FRS) system was employed to measure optical properties of breast tissue.
• Studies were conducted on excised normal and tumor breast samples from patients with Invasive Ductal Carcinoma (IDC).
• A preliminary study validated the use of pre-frozen tissue samples for optical property analysis.

Main Results:

• Freezing and thawing breast tissue did not significantly alter optical properties compared to fresh samples.
• The tr-FRS system demonstrated significant differences in optical data between normal and tumor breast tissue in 40 matched pairs.
• The system successfully differentiated malignant from normal breast tissue in excised samples.

Conclusions:

• The tr-FRS system shows promise for distinguishing malignant from normal breast tissue.
• This technology has the potential to be developed into an intraoperative real-time margin assessment tool.
• Further development could lead to improved surgical outcomes in breast cancer treatment.