Clinical usefulness of endoscopic ultrasonography-guided fine-needle aspiration in the diagnosis and staging of lung cancer

Lung cancer is the most common cause of cancer-related mortality in Singapore, and accurate staging of lung cancer is therefore of paramount importance. Several non-invasive and invasive modalities can be used to stage lung cancer. Endoscopic ultrasonography-guided fine-needle aspiration (EUS-FNA) is a safe procedure that is performed under conscious sedation and has a sensitivity of up to 90-98 percent in expert hands. In addition, nodal groups that are inaccessible by cervical mediastinoscopy (such as the aortopulmonary window lymph nodes) can be sampled by EUS-FNA. We present three cases in which EUS-FNA was used successfully to diagnose and stage lung cancer, thus avoiding surgery.