A high-tech pen could improve cancer removal

Scientists have developed a handheld tool that detects cancer in patients within ten seconds with about 96 percent accuracy. The device, called the MasSpec Pen, can provide surgeons with precise diagnostic information on what tissue to cut or preserve during surgery, helping improve treatment and reduce the chances of cancer recurrence.

Although removing every trace of cancer tissue is critical to improving a patient’s survival, equally important is being able to preserve healthy tissue. While current methods enable doctors to distinguish cancerous from healthy tissue, for example using lab tests or frozen section analysis, they can be time-consuming or inaccurate, increasing risks for patients.

Needing a solution that produced both quick and accurate cancer detection, a team of researchers at The University of Texas at Austin developed a handheld “pen” and tested it on tissues removed from 253 cancer patients. The MasSpec Pen, described in Science Translational Medicine, was able to differentiate cancerous and healthy tissue faster than current methods by using a tiny amount of water to extract molecules from a patient’s tissue.

"Any time we can offer the patient a more precise surgery, a quicker surgery or a safer surgery, that's something we want to do," said James Suliburk, head of endocrine surgery at Baylor College of Medicine and a collaborator on the project to Science Daily. "This technology does all three. It allows us to be much more precise in what tissue we remove and what we leave behind."

With further improvements and testing, the team hopes to start using the technology during surgeries in 2018.

This story was originally published in the Global Health and Travel issue of January 2018.