A fine needle biopsy is used to extract tissue samples from the pancreas to analyze for suspected cancer. In 2012, nearly 44,000 people were diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, says the American Cancer Society. The procedure used to diagnose pancreatic malignancies is endoscopic ultrasound guided fine needle aspiration, said Dr. Kenneth Chang, executive director, H.H. Chao Comprehensive Digestive Disease Center at the University of California-Irvine.
Fine needle aspiration and endoscopic ultrasound, however, are not 100 percent accurate in detecting pancreatic cancer. The latest development is an improvement of this method: a single-use needle that is disposable, used for both aspiration and biopsy. It’s called EchoTip ProCore.
In a recent study (Iwashita, et al), this 25-gauge needle detected, with 88 percent accuracy, pancreatic tumors after only one pass to the tumor. Accuracy rose to 91 percent with additional jumps. There were no complications in the study of the patient.
What makes the ProCore EchoTip biopsy needle so unique is that it is smaller than other fine needle biopsy instruments, so it can take samples from hard-to-reach areas and slowly pull them out of the tissue. Other unique features of this needle add to its precision edge.
Dr. Chang emphasizes that the EchoTip ProCore gives doctors an advantage because of its precision in the early detection of pancreatic cancer. This cuts down on the number of patients who must return visits to their doctors for further sampling. This advanced needle biopsy is available to doctors in major markets all over the world.
“If a patient has pancreatic cancer, the only chance of cure or long-term survival is early diagnosis,” says Dr. Chang, in an interview for this article. I wondered what would lead a doctor to order a fine needle biopsy in the first place, since the earlier this procedure detects pancreatic cancer, the better the odds for the patient’s survival.
Dr. Chang explains that a person has “undiagnosed weight loss or pain, or disease, or late-onset diabetes – and this A CT scan may show a mass, but a CT scan may not show anything suspicious.
After this point, says Dr. Chang, the patient is referred to a gastroenterologist (GI specialty), and this doctor performs an endoscopic ultrasound, using a fine biopsy needle – a sample of the EchoTip instrument.
Another circumstance that can result in the decision to perform a needle biopsy for a suspected pancreatic tumor is when the patient feels well, but has an ultrasound or CT scan for an unknown reason, as Dr. Chang “protecting. looking at the liver, kidneys, or even total body scans to check the exercise to find a tumor or cyst, and Endoscopic ultrasound comes to us, and EchoTip is chosen.”
A third reason is that patients undergoing fine-needle biopsy are at high risk for pancreatic cancer, despite not showing symptoms. Perhaps they have a family history of this disease, or risk factors, such as chronic pancreatitis, genetic susceptibility to pancreatic cancer and the presence of certain types of pancreas, says Dr. Chang. Such patients are referred for endoscopic ultrasound, and the EchoTip needle is used.
Sources:
cancer.org/Cancer/pancreaticus/DetailedGuide/pancreatic-cancer-key-statistics.
cancer.org/Cancer/pancreatic/DetailedGuide/pancreatic-cancer-detection.
