Leaders in Pharmaceutical Business Intelligence (LPBI) Group

Virtual Biopsy – is it possible?

Author and Curator: Dror Nir, PhD

In a remark made to my last post: New envelopment in measuring mechanical properties of tissue, Dr. Aviva Lev-Ari, PhD, RN, Director and Founder of our Open Access Online Scientific Journal:  Leaders of Pharmaceutical Business Intelligence, asked whether OCT can be used for the purpose of performing biopsy. My answer to her question was “YES”. I thought that it will be worthwhile explaining why I am so “optimistic” about this:

A conventional biopsy is a process where a tissue sample is being cut out of the body and after being subjected to all kind of chemical processes a thin-film of tissue is trimmed and read under the microscope by a trained pathologist. Can imaging provide histological assessment of “thin-film” of tissue without cutting it out of the body? The answer would be positive if the imaging will result with high resolution reconstruction of a tissue sample identical in quality to a “live-sample” that is put under the microscope.

I was happy to find support to my optimism regarding the feasibility of constructing such device in the following article: Virtual skin biopsy by optical coherence tomography: the first quantitative imaging biomarker for scleroderma published on February 20^th 2013 in Ann Rheum Dis doi:10.1136/annrheumdis-2012-202682

 This article reports an original, first study to perform histological comparison and explore Optical coherence tomography (“OCT”) as a potential imaging technique for the clinical assessment of patients presenting with systemic sclerosis (“SSc”). In their study the investigators used a device emitting low-intensity infrared laser beam, capable of producing high-contrast images of skin up to 2 mm deep with resolutions of 4–10 μm.

[START ORIGINAL PAPER]

ABSTRACT

Background

Skin involvement is of major prognostic value in systemic sclerosis (SSc) and often the primary outcome in clinical trials. Nevertheless, an objective, validated biomarker of skin fibrosis is lacking. Optical coherence tomography (OCT) is an imaging technology providing high-contrast images with 4 μm resolution, comparable with microscopy (‘virtual biopsy’). The present study evaluated OCT to detect and quantify skin fibrosis in SSc.

Methods

We performed 458 OCT scans of hands and forearms on 21 SSc patients and 22 healthy controls. We compared the findings with histology from three skin biopsies and by correlation with clinical assessment of the skin. We calculated the optical density (OD) of the OCT images employing Matlab software and performed statistical analysis of the results, including intraobserver/ interobserver reliability, employing SPSS software.

 Results

Comparison of OCT images with skin histology indicated a progressive loss of visualisation of the dermal–epidermal junction associated with dermal fibrosis. Furthermore, SSc affected skin showed a consistent decrease of OD in the papillary dermis, progressively worse in patients with worse modified Rodnan skin score (p<0.0001). Additionally, clinically unaffected skin was also distinguishable from healthy skin for its specific pattern of OD decrease in the reticular dermis (p<0.001). The technique showed an excellent intraobserver and interobserver reliability (intraclass correlation coefficient >0.8).

Conclusions

OCT of the skin could offer a feasible and reliable quantitative outcome measure in SSc. Studies determining OCT sensitivity to change over time and its role in defining skin vasculopathy may pave the way to defining OCT as a valuable imaging biomarker in SSc.

Virtual skin biopsy by OCT

The OCT images acquisition allowed the reconstruction of a virtual skin biopsy measuring 4×0.4×2 mm. The main structure of the healthy skin was easily recognisable by OCT (figure 1).

Virtual biopsy of forearm skin by optical coherence tomography. Representative 3D reconstruction from the tomography of healthy and systemic sclerosis (SSc) (site modified Rodnan skin score=3) skin scans. The keratin of the skin appears as a white line on the surface (k). The epidermis (ED) is quite visible in the healthy skin by the contrast with the increased optical density of the papillary dermis (PD). The dermal– epidermal junction (DEJ) is quite visible in the healthy skin between the ED and PD. On the contrary, neither clear distinction of ED and PD or DEJ is appreciable in the SSc skin. The vessels (*) are numerous and very well recognisable in healthy skin, whereas they appear less numerous and less distinct in the OCT image of SSc skin. Total depth of 3D reconstruction=1.2 mm. Scale bars are calculated by ImageJ.

Some quantitative results  – in images:

Validation of optical coherence tomography (OCT) images by histology. (A and B) H&E staining (A) and corresponding OCT scan (B) from a healthy control (HC). The green line is the mean A-scan of the entire OCT image (100 scans) overlaid by matching the scale bars of OCT and histology. The green arrow indicates the nadir of the valley in the mean A-scan, which corresponds to the dermal–epidermal junction clearly visible on both images. The green arrowhead indicates the second peak of the mean OCT A-Scan which corresponds by the overlay to the most superficial region of the papillary dermis. (C and D) H&E staining (C) and corresponding OCT scan (D) from a systemic sclerosis (SSc) patient (site modified Rodnan skin score =3). The red line is the mean A-scan of the OCT image, overlaid by matching the scale bars in the two panels. The red arrow indicates the nadir in the valley of the mean A-scan, which in this case does not correspond to the dermal–epidermal junction. The red arrowhead corresponds to the second peak in mean A-Scan. (E) Overlay of HC and SSc. Scale bar=240 μm.

Optical coherence tomography (OCT) of affected and not affected skin in plaque morphea. (A) OCT of not affected skin. Vertical scale represents depth in micrometre from the surface. The dermal–epidermal junction (DEJ) level is indicated by the white dotted line. Mean A-scan curve is overlaid and displayed in green. (B) OCT of affected skin in morphea patient. Mean A-scan curve is overlaid and displayed in red. Note the poorly visible DEJ and the valley of the curve below the DEJ (arrowhead). (C) Overlay of mean A-scan curves from the analysis of affected and unaffected skin in a morphea patient. Note that in the curves overlay graph both the difference depth of the first valley is clearly appreciable (arrowheads). Similarly the second mean A-scan peak (arrow) is subtle in the affected skin, similar to scleroderma affected skin.

DISCUSSION

The current gold standard for semiquantitative assessment of skin fibrosis, the mRSS, suffers from several shortcomings ranging from the subjectivity of skin palpation assessments and the high level of skill required from the clinical investigator. Even more importantly, a meta-analysis of three independent studies determined an overall within patient interobserver SD of five units independently of the mean skin score,[6 21] which represents an SE ranging from 20% to 26%. A primary outcome measure with 25% of SE entails the recruitment of a large number of patients to attain statistical validity in minimally significant changes, a task often difficult to accomplish given the comparatively low incidence of SSc.

A robust imaging biomarker for the assessment of skin fibrosis in SSc has not previously been reported. Herein we report the first study aimed to validate OCT for the quantitative assessment of skin involvement in SSc.

To date, the limited data on surrogate outcome measures for skin involvement are largely composed of histopathological or molecular changes in affected skin.[22 23] Despite conceptually very valuable, these studies, involving skin biopsies, are invasive and limited because of a site bias, referring to only one precise body area. Moreover, they are difficult to repeat in longitudinal manner and showed no sensitivity to change over time.[24] In this study, we evaluated OCT skin scanning as a reliable and quanti­tative tool that could be used as a surrogate marker of skin fibrosis. The technique requires minimal operator training, less than 10s per site examined, and offers the great advantage of saving image files for further or centralised operator independ­ent analysis. This latter is a particularly useful tool limiting the ‘hands on’ time in the clinic office and allowing a centralised, blinded assessment of results in clinical trials.

We observed an excellent correlation of OCT mean A-Scan curves and mRSS score at the site of analysis. More importantly, the corroboration of our OCT findings with pathological changes at the DEJ provides a robust construct validity for the technique. Of interest, we found that the changes of the OD of the dermis in SSc are similar to the ones observed in a case of plaque morphea, corroborating even further the potential value of OCT in measuring skin fibrosis.

Additional Comment

HFUS (High Frequensy Ultrasound) has been recently suggested to offer a quantitative assessment of skin thickness in SSc by several studies.8–10 In contrast with ultrasound, OCT does not require any use of gels, is able to give a higher resolution images and the analysis algo­rithm is automatic, not involving any operator interpretation. Nevertheless, since the penetration of OCT is limited to the first millimetre of skin, OCT and HFUS may be explored as comple­mentary imaging biomarkers in SSc.

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