Raman spectroscopy for the diagnosis of dysplasia in columnar and squamous epithelium

The incidence of oesophageal and laryngeal cancer has risen over past decades. The early detection of disease is vital for improved prognosis. The current gold standard method of tissue diagnosis is histopathology, which is invasive, costly and somewhat subjective. Raman spectroscopy however has potential for the non-invasive, early, in-vivo diagnosis of the biochemical changes associated with malignancy. Good quality Raman spectra have been measured in vitro using oesophageal and laryngeal tissue. Multivariate analysis has been implemented using principal component and linear discriminant analysis techniques. Sensitivity and specificity of more than 80% has been achieved for the discrimination of dysplasia and cancer, for both oesophageal and laryngeal tissue. On comparison with histopathology these results are seen to be an improvement, since pathology lacks sensitivity and specificity due to the subjective nature of the diagnosis. Thus illustrating that excellent discrimination between normal, dysplastic and cancerous tissue can be achieved using Raman Spectroscopy.