Does cryoprobe biopsy increase the diagnostic yield in endobronchial tumor lesions?

Abstract

Background Lung cancer is considered to be one of the most common causes of death among patients with confirmed cancer all over the world. Bronchoscopic diagnosis with ordinary forceps biopsy (FB) is applied primarily for those with endobronchial mass or with suspected visible abnormalities. The small-sized sample is the main limitation for the diagnostic yield by this procedure. Cryoprobe that is mainly used for the cryotherapy purpose has been involved and used nowadays for adequate diagnostic biopsy in patients with suspected endobronchial tumors or lesions. Aim The aim was to compare the flexible cryoprobe with conventional FB regarding diagnostic yield, and to show the feasibility, safety, and possible complications in patients with endobronchial tumor lesions. Patients and methods A total of 40 patients with endoscopically visible lesions were randomized into two groups: group I included 20 patients in whom biopsies were carried out using FB (two samples) and group II included 20 patients in whom biopsies were carried out using cryobiopsy (CB) (one sample). Results There was higher significant diagnostic yield of CB as regards the diameter size, finally diagnosed type of lung cancer and that was diagnosed from the first time bronchoscopy or after redobrochoscopy than FB. Bleeding was the only detected complication during both procedures, but there were no statistically significant difference among both techniques as regards bleeding during procedure, need for hamostatics during the procedure, hemoptysis postprocedure or need for hemostatics postprocedure. Conclusion Endobronchial CB is a safe, successful, and confident technique with superior diagnostic yield compared with ordinary conventional FB mainly because of the larger size and better quality of the obtained specimens’ excellent tissue preservation than that can be used during conventional fiberoptic FB.