Endobronchial Ultrasound to Evaluate Downstaging of Lung Cancer After Combined Chemotherapy and Radiation Treatment

While previous studies did indeed advance novel treatment methods for NSCLC, the team in Bangkok Hospital found it curious that even in a recent study published in April 2012, the most advanced staging evaluation methods used were mediastinoscopy or mediastinotomy (following bronchoscopy, bone scan, computed tomography (CT) scan of the chest) to acquire biopsy samples from lymph nodes. A randomized trial in 2010 of two-hundred and forty one patients revealed that a staging strategy combining endosonography and surgical staging showed a higher sensitivity rate for mediastinal nodal metastases when compared to surgical staging alone among patients with (suspected) NSCLC. A minimallyinvasive procedure, endobronchial ultrasonography is currently considered the gold standard in the evaluation of mediastinal lymph nodes and lung lesions along with its other usage in the clinical set-up.