Background: The purpose of this study was to explore the feasibility and potential drawbacks of near-infrared (NIR) endoscopy with indocyanine green (ICG) to examine mucosal head and neck lesions.
Methods: NIR ICG endoscopy was applied to image head and neck cancer epithelium in vivo. The evaluation of the ICG videos was performed off-line independently by 2 evaluators and blinded with respect to final histopathological results from biopsies taken as the gold standard.
Results: Forty percent of the lesions from 55 patients were histologically malignant. ICG positivity showed a sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy to be related to a malignant tumor of 90.5%, 90.9%, and 89.1%, respectively. The kappa index for the interobserver assessment showed a 94.4% agreement for the assessment of the ICG positivity. Side effects of the NIR ICG endoscopy did not arise.
Conclusion: NIR ICG endoscopy in patients with mucosal head and neck lesions was feasible and safe. It might help intraoperatively to differentiate benign from malignant lesions. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Head Neck 39: 234-240, 2017.
Keywords: diagnostics; fluorescence imaging; head and neck cancer; indocyanine green; near-infrared endoscopy; tumor margin.
© 2016 The Authors Head & Neck Published by Wiley Periodicals, Inc.