Instant Digital Pathology

Mohs Surgery

Confocal microscopy removes the need for frozen section histology during Mohs surgery, reducing the time needed to complete surgery by more than 50 %. Integrated in a surgical workflow, the VivaScope scans provide information equivalent to H&E or frozen section histology slide without the need for a laboratory and in just a few minutes. Reliability of the technology has been assessed in numerous clinical studies showing very high sensitivity and specificity.

Diagnostic Biopsies

Only few minutes after taking a biopsy, the histology of the tissue can be evaluated and the presence of a tumour determined. Appropriate treatment of the skin lesion can begin immediately after.

Radical Prostatectomy

Recently, instant examination using a VivaScope 2500 has been performed during robot-assisted radical prostatectomy where non-neoplastic and cancerous prostate tissue was compared to a histopathological diagnosis. Preliminary results show an overall substantial diagnostic agreement of 91 % between confocal and histopathological diagnoses (n=89). (Puliatti.S et al., BJU Int. 2019)

Urothelial Carcinoma

In a second study, the diagnosis of high-grade/low-grade urothelial carcinoma in bladder and ureter has been assessed. Preliminary results showed a 100 % accordance between the grading of FCM images and the final histopathology of all bladder urothelial carcinoma specimens (n=8).

Ex vivo confocal microscopy offers the possibility to improve the workflow during surgery by significantly reducing waiting time for diagnostic results. Instead of waiting for results of cryosections, a diagnostic examination can be performed directly after the resection of tissue.

Confocal laser scanning microscopy provides high-quality images revealing sub-cellular details within minutes. The technology offers diagnostic insights into breast cancer biopsies and can be used for margin control of excised breast cancer tissue. Pathologists can access the images remotely, independent of their location and provide a diagnosis.

The confocal microscope VS2500M-G4 can be used inside the surgery room. Remote access offers the possibility to assess tissue directly after the excision and loss of precious time can be avoided. The histology of the investigated tissue is displayed in pseudocoloured images that share a high similarity with H&E-stained sections (optically and information-wise). The technology is especially suited for adipose tissue, which is difficult to section with cryostats. The tissue does not sustain damage from the imaging procedure and can be used for standard histology afterwards.