Intraoperative imaging technology cuts need for repetitive lumpectomy

Lightpoint Medical, developers of medical imaging technologies, has announced results for its clinical trial in regards to intraoperative imaging technology for breast cancer surgery.

"These pilot clinical trial results are an important step in Lightpoint Medical's mission to provide clinicians with more accurate tools to guide cancer surgery,” said David Tuch, MD, CEO of Lightpoint Medical. “We look forward to undertaking further clinical trials to validate these results in larger patient populations."

As the primary treatment for early-stage breast cancer, lumpectomies are often performed more than once on patients due to the lack of precision in detecting cancer. For the 25 percent of patients needing a second breast-conserving surgery, intraoperative molecule imaging could be able to assess the extent of cancer on the first try and avoid repeat operations.

In the first human clinical trial, intraoperative molecular imaging was found to be a low cost, effective and feasible procedure for assessing tumor margin intraoperatively.

"We're delighted to present these exciting first-in-human results on the use of intraoperative molecular imaging in breast-conserving surgery,” said Arnie Purushotham, with King's College and Guy's Hospital in London. “This clinical trial showed that molecular imaging agreed strongly with gold standard pathology and was straight-forward to interpret. Although the technology is still in its early days, we believe intraoperative molecular imaging holds considerable promise for improving clinical outcomes in breast cancer patients."