Place of ultrasound endoscopy in the staging of oesophageal cancer

摘要

The pretherapeutic staging of the oesophageal cancer was one of the first indications of upper ultrasound endoscopy (USE). Indeed from the early 80s, better results than those obtained with other imaging techniques have been reported. They still remain unequalled whereas several technical advances (miniprobes, high frequencies, US-guided cytological puncture) increased the accuracy of EUS and extended its use [1, 2]. At the time of combined treatments and prognosis evaluation, the place of EE is thus confirmed in the main decisional trees and protocols of treatment of oesophageal cancer.