Colon Optical Biopsy

Ulcerative colitis (UC) is a chronic inflammatory condition of the GI tract that produces abscesses, ulcerations and bleeding. UC affects up to 780,000 individuals in the United States and Canada and is newly diagnosed in 7,000 to 46,000 individuals per year. UC is associated with approximately 5x increase in risk of developing colorectal cancer compared to the general population, with colorectal cancer accounting for one sixth of all deaths in UC patients. Unfortunately, early-stage dysplastic lesions are often flat, diffuse and multifocal in these individuals. As a result dysplastic lesions are easily obscured by the gross inflammatory background of UC, making early detection extremely challenging. UC and Crohn's disease, a related condition, therefore represent diseases that can potentially benefit from 3D-OCT endomicroscopy examination for detection of abnormalities and assessment of therapies.

Additional technical information:

Three-dimensional endomicroscopy of the human colon using optical coherence tomography

 

3D OCT images of normal colon tissue

3D-OCT images of ulcerative colitis