A Quicker Way to Identify Skin Cancer

A new device that a doctor holds right over a mole uses laser light to determine if it's melanoma.

Detecting melanoma—the most lethal form of skin cancer—still relies on dermatologists eyeballing moles and deciding which ones warrant a biopsy. A new handheld device developed by scientists at the British Columbia Cancer Agency (BCCA) and licensed to Verisante Technology could provide instant information about the molecular makeup of moles.

The device, called the Verisante Aura, is held above a mole, and uses Raman spectroscopy, a technique that distinguishes molecules using their vibrational states, to scan for those whose relative concentrations are characteristic of melanoma. The device returns a verdict within seconds. Following a successful small clinical trial, Verisante is now analyzing the results of another trial with 1,000 moles. The company plans to seek approval from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and Canada Health later this year.

For patients whose melanoma isn't caught early, the life expectancy is less than a year. And rates of the disease are skyrocketing: the current estimate is that one in 58 Americans will get melanoma in their lifetime, up from one in 1,500 in 1935.

Work on the new device began in 2000, when dermatologists at BCCA were studying whether certain skin diseases could be identified by their unique spectral characteristics. In Raman spectroscopy, laser light changes the vibrational state of the bonds within molecules, which in turn causes a shift in the light that is reflected back to a sensor. The magnitude and direction of that shift reveal what molecules are in the sample, and at what concentration.
Link