Abstract
Fine-needle aspiration cytology is the standard technique to diagnose thyroid pathologies. However, this method has a high percentage of inconclusive and false-negative results for benign and malignant lesions. Hence, it is important to search for a new method to assist medical evaluation during these surgical procedures. The use of time-resolved fluorescence techniques to detect biochemical composition and tissue structure alterations could help to develop a portable, minimally invasive, and non-destructive method to assist medical evaluation. In this study, we investigated 17 human thyroid samples by absorbance, fluorescence, excitation, and time-resolved fluorescence measurements. This initial investigation has demonstrated that thyroid fluorescence originates from many endogenous fluorophores and culminates in several bands. The fluorescence lifetimes of benign and malignant lesions were significantly different, as attested by analysis of variance using Tukey test with individual confidence level of 98.06 %. Our results suggest that fluorescence lifetimes of benign and malignant lesions can potentially assist diagnosis. After further investigations, fluorescence methods could become a tool for the surgeon to identify differences between normal and pathological thyroid tissues.
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Acknowledgments
The authors would like to acknowledge Universidade de São Paulo – USP, Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo – FAPESP (Projects number 2011/07960-4 and 2012/02460-6), and Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico – CNPq (Project number 160014/2012-3) for the grants and fellowships given to this research. The authors thank Cynthia Maria de Campos Prado Manso for linguistic advice.
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Brandao, M.P., Iwakura, R., Basilio, F.S. et al. Optical Characterization of Normal, Benign, and Malignant Thyroid Tissue: A Pilot Study. J Fluoresc 25, 465–471 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10895-015-1542-0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10895-015-1542-0