An important issue in the treatment of malignant tumours is concerned with
the completeness of the resection/or destruction destruction of cancer and precancerous
lesions, without which no curative intent can be contemplated. In lung
cancer, be it central or peripheral, the pre-cancerous lesions, usually at the margin of
cancer itself, will have to be treated.
Image-guided lung cancer surgery and/or therapy is a method in which intraoperative
real-time and updated images are provided to the operator, to allow him to access not
only the tumour but also provide him with the outline of pre-cancerous lesions. As
such, image-guided surgery and therapy provide navigational tools and real insight to
perform complete treatment of cancer.
In this chapter, the various methods to identify small lesions within the wide field of
the lung tissue are referred to and some of the methods which are currently under
translational studies are explored.
Keywords: Fluorescence guided operations for lung cancer, Intraoperative
localization of a pulmonary nodule, Image-guided intra-operative navigation for
lung cancer.
