Gleason score is a highly prognostic factor for prostate cancer describing the microscopic architecture of the tumor tissue. The standard procedure for evaluating Gleason scores, namely biopsy, is to remove prostate tissue for observation under microscope.
Currently, biopsies are guided by transrectal ultrasound (TRUS). Due to the low sensitivity of TRUS to prostate cancer (PCa), non-guided and saturated biopsies are frequently employed, unavoidably causing pain, damage to the normal prostate tissues and other complications. More importantly, due to the limited number of biopsy cores, current procedure could either miss early stage small tumors or undersample aggressive cancers. Photoacoustic (PA) measurement has the unique capability of evaluating tissue microscopic architecture information at ultrasonic resolution. By frequency domain analysis of the broadband PA signal, namely PA spectral analysis (PASA), the microscopic architecture within the assessed tissue can be quantified. This study investigates the feasibility of evaluating Gleason scores by PASA. Simulations with the classic Gleason patterns and experiment measurements from human PCa tissues have demonstrated strong correlation between the PASA parameters and the Gleason scores.
Biomedical optics express. 2015 Nov 09*** epublish ***
Guan Xu, Mandy C Davis, Javed Siddiqui, Scott A Tomlins, Shengsong Huang, Lakshmi P Kunju, John T Wei, Xueding Wang
Department of Radiology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA. , Department of Pathology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA. , Department of Pathology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA. , Department of Pathology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA. , Department of Urology, Tongji Hospital of Tongji University, Putuo, Shanghai 200065, China. , Department of Pathology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA. , Department of Urology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA. , Department of Radiology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA ; Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan 48109, USA.