A knife that sniffs out tumours could be a ‘game-changer’ in cancer surgery.
The smart scalpel allows surgeons to perform riskier, more effective, operations, say scientists.
It works by sniffing out cancerous cells, meaning doctors can be more certain they have removed entire tumours.
Named the iKnife, it uses a ‘traffic light’ system to identify cancerous and healthy tissue on the spot.
It is a hi-tech form of an electrical scalpel, a tool routinely used by surgeons that uses electricity to sear through membranes and internal organs.
As the knife cuts, smoke from the burned tissue is pumped into a mass spectrometer, a machine that produces a chemical ‘fingerprint’ of the atoms fed into it. Red indicates cancer and green is healthy tissue.
The knife was 100 per cent accurate in diagnosing cancerous tissue in 91 patients. It was as reliable as tissue testing, which can take up to 30 minutes. The knife is now being tested in clinical trials to see if it saves lives.
The iKnife’s inventor, Dr Zoltan Takats, from Imperial College London, said: ‘We can give feed back to surgeons, in some cases, in less than a second.
‘This could be a real game-changer for tumour resection surgery,’ he added.
One in five patients who have a breast lump removed need follow-up surgery.
But the iKnife tells medics exactly where a tumour is and when it has all been removed.
As well as potentially improving survival rates, the device could cut follow up operations and surgery times.
‘In principle, it could push the line of what is operable further down the road,’ said Dr Takats. ‘Cases that are currently opened and closed back up may now fall into the operable category.’