Optical Coherence Tomography for Margin identification in BCC
Research type
Research Study
Full title
A Comparison between Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) determined basal cell carcinoma (BCC) margins (OCT) against surgeon excision margins and histology – an observational pilot study.
IRAS ID
218351
Contact name
Anna- Victoria Giblin
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 5 months, 18 days
Research summary
Basal Cell Carcinoma (BCC) is the commonest skin cancer in the UK accounting for almost 80% of all skin cancers with approximately 80 000 cases being diagnosed in the UK each year. Gold standard management for BCC is surgical excision to achieve complete clearance of tumour. Despite surgical efforts, excisions, after thorough histopathological assessment, are often found to be ‘incomplete’ at one or more excision margins, or conversely, very widely completely excised with a larger rim of normal tissue than is always required.\n\nOptical Coherence Tomography (OCT), represents a form of non-invasive, non irradiating optical imaging using infra red waves rather than radiation, which has been shown to improve diagnostic accuracy for BCC and allows determination of pre surgical excision margins. Ensuring complete treatment of BCC first time with minimal unnecessary tissue removal and scarring or reconstruction should be an achievable gold standard.\n\nIn this study, the excision markings made pre-operatively by the surgeon will be compared with those made by the researcher guided by OCT scanned borders of the lesion. The surgeon will mark their excision margins directly onto the skin using a fine tipped (<1mm), skin marking pen. The researcher will mark onto a sheet of Tegaderm (sticky clear plastic dressing)placed over the surgeon’s markings. This has been tested. Each marking will be compared against the resulting histology of the excised lesion to determine whether the OCT marking would have resulted in more appropriate excision margins had these markings been used to guide surgical excision. Since this is an observational feasibility study, the OCT markings will not be used to guide surgical excision in this study – surgical excision will proceed in the standard way with the planned excision margins marked by the surgeon pre-operatively in the usual way and the researcher’s OCT guided margins will not be visible during surgery.\n
REC name
North West - Preston Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
17/NW/0046
Date of REC Opinion
16 Jan 2017
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion