Bioimpedance: A Tool for Screening Oral Cancer - A Systematic Review

The successful management of cancer depends on proper screening and treatment methods. Bioimpedance spectroscopy (BIS) is an established technique in detecting breast cancer, cervical cancer, and prostate cancer. This systematic review sought to investigate the current evidence regarding the clinical application of bioimpedance in the detection of oral squamous cell carcinoma and oral potentially malignant disorders.

The Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses guidelines were followed to perform this review. Electronic databases such as PubMed, MEDLINE, Embase, EBSCOhost, and Google Scholar were searched till March 2022. Articles published in the English medical literature on human participants report on the application of BIS in the screening of precancerous and cancerous lesions. The primary endpoint was defined as the ability to differentiate between normal and cancerous tissue.

A total of 6754 articles were identified; of which 481 were eligible for inclusion. Only five articles met the eligibility criteria and were included in the study. Qualitative analysis for each study was done to assess the data provided. All the studies demonstrated a significant divergence in BIS metrics between cancerous and normal tissue at 20 Hz and 50 KHz.

Bioimpedance appears to be a promising novel tool for the detection of various malignancies which can be used in community screening due to its noninvasiveness and portability.