Method for identifying malignancies in barrett's esophagus using white light endoscopy

Abstract

A method is described for computing a statistically significant difference between dysplasia and Barrett's esophagus (both with and without inflammatory component) using a discriminate function with diffuse reflectance measurements performed at a minimum of four different wavelengths of 485, 513, 598, and 629 nm. The discriminate function found depends both on local blood fraction volume THB and oxygenation SO2. A pull-back approach of spectral data acquisition is disclosed which takes into account tissue motility in esophagus and measurement geometry peculiarities. The pull-back approach provides a significant improvement of measurement reproducibility and reduction of data deviation by 75-100%, resulting in a better discrimination between different histological groups.

Description

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS[0001]This application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application Ser. No. 61 / 102,091, filed Oct. 2, 2008, the entire content of which is incorporated herein by reference.FIELD OF THE INVENTION[0002]The invention relates to white light endoscopy to guide the biopsy collection, and more particularly to detecting an intrinsic optical signature of early cancer lesions in Barrett's esophagus (BE) using diffuse reflectance spectroscopy, without staining or dying to enhance malignant / non-malignant contrast.BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION[0003]Gastrointestinal (GI) malignancies continue to be the second leading cause of cancer-related deaths in the United States (24%). One of the highest shares in GI malignancies belongs to esophagus cancer (10% or 12000-14000 per year based on 2000-2003 statistics). People from the Western hemisphere tend to develop esophageal cancer based on prior metaplastic mucosal transformation often called as Barrett's esophag...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

"The patent describes a method for detecting malignant and non-malignant tissue using diffuse reflectance collected at wide field illumination and point measurement. The method uses a set of at least four distinctive wavelength ranges to achieve this. The algorithm is based on a linear polynomial function called B4. The method has been tested on 32 patients with displasia and has shown a sensitivity of 77% and specificity of 81%. The optimal result discriminate function is based on diffuse reflectance measured at four wavelengths: 485±5, 513±5, 598±2, and 629±5 nm. The method can discriminate between dysplastic and non-dysplastic tissue with a high degree of accuracy. Adding another wavelength of 501±5 nm to the discriminate function can improve the accuracy of discriminating between benign and dysplastic tissue."

Problems solved by technology

Recently developed methods are either small field of view and, consequently, very time consuming (Raman spectroscopy, Optical Coherence Tomography, Doppler Optical Coherence Tomography, Laser Scattering Spectroscopy, confocal endoscopy) or require application of external dyes (chromo-endoscopy, fluorescence imaging of ALA-5 staining) Narrow band imaging and near-infrared multimodal endoscopy methods were reported just within last two years and still required to prove its sensitivity and specificity abilities.

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