The margin is everything.
In oncologic surgery, the difference between cure and recurrence often comes down to the margin — the boundary between tumor and normal tissue. Today that boundary is judged by eye, by feel, and by frozen-section pathology that takes twenty minutes per sample. Fluorescence guidance offers something better: a real-time visual signal of where tumor actually is.
The group's Laryngoscope study of systemic 5-ALA in head and neck squamous cell carcinoma was among the first to test this approach in the field, and the same research engine extends to label-free Raman spectroscopy for instant margin assessment — imaging chemistry instead of dye.
For patients with sinonasal and skull base tumors.
Fluorescence techniques are deployed in selected tumor cases under research protocols at Mount Sinai — ask about eligibility during a surgical consultation.