Cervical cancer staging - preoperative assessment of tumor extent (a review of the most recent ultrasound studies)
Abstract
For treatment planning of cervical cancer it is necessary preoperatively to determine the presence and size of residual tumour after the biopsy, the tumour topography within the cervix and the parametrial and lymph node status. According to current data, ultrasound is comparably accurate with magnetic resonance imaging in view of tumour presence and local extent assessment.
Ultrasound, if compared with the magnetic resonance imaging, does not have known contraindications and it is a broadly available diagnostic test. Currently no advanced imaging technique exists that can reliably detect infiltrated lymph nodes in the clinically early stage of the disease, as it often manifests as micrometastatic involvement in non-enlarged lymph nodes.
The sensitivity of lymph node detection using ultrasound in the early stage is around 40%, but the specificity is high (96%). For daily practice, this means that a negative ultrasound finding should be always verified by surgical staging based on systematic lymphadenectomy, while positive ultrasound finding usually changes the treatment strategy.