NCT03501823

Development of Photoacoustic Tomography

Status unknown Last updated 18 April 2018

What this trial tests

trial testing Photoacoustic tomography in Cancer in 27 participants. Status unknown.

Timeline

23 February 2018

Primary endpoint
1 November 2018

1 November 2018

Quick facts

Lead sponsor	University College, London
Status	Status unknown
Study type	OBSERVATIONAL
Enrollment	27
Start date	23 February 2018
Primary completion	1 November 2018
Estimated completion	1 November 2018
Sites	1 location across United Kingdom

Drugs / interventions tested

• Photoacoustic tomography

Conditions studied

• Cancer — all drugs for Cancer →
• Cardiovascular Diseases — all drugs for Cardiovascular Diseases →

Sponsor

University College, London

Who can join

18 and older, any sex, with Cancer or Cardiovascular Diseases. Patients with the condition only — healthy volunteers not accepted.

Sponsor's own description

Cancer is one of the leading causes of death internationally. When planning treatment for most cancers, it is important to know how far it has spread, including whether or not the cancer has spread to the local lymph nodes (LNs) because this affects the treatment strategy. This is termed "staging", and can be achieved by medical imaging, such as by ultrasound, computed tomography (CT) or magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans. However, these are imperfect, and sometimes incorrect treatment decisions are made because of errors in staging by imaging. Improved accuracy would be of great clinical value for almost all solid organ tumours. An emerging technique to address this is photoacoustic tomography (PAT), a non-invasive, safe modality that relies on light and sound to generate images. Laser light is applied to the area to be imaged; this is absorbed, and causes the illuminated tissue to emit ultrasound waves. These can be detected and turned into an image by post-processing techniques similar to those used in conventional diagnostic ultrasound. By changing the wavelength of light used, the technique can be adjusted to optimise detection of various body components, including fat, water and both oxygenated and deoxygenated blood. This means the images can represent tissue composition and function rather than just anatomical structure. Hitherto, most work on PAT has been on healthy volunteers, and has focused on imaging the vasculature. We would like to see whether we are able to generate images of deeper structures inside the body. Initially we will focus on patients with vascular disease, whom we expect to have abnormal blood vessels; and subsequently we will attempt to image tumours and LNs in patients with cancer.

Publications & conference data

No peer-reviewed publications indexed yet for this trial.