Differentiating head and neck carcinoma from lung carcinoma with an electronic nose: a proof of concept study

• Published in: European archives of oto-rhino-laryngology Vol. 273; no. 11; pp. 3897 - 3903
• Main Authors: van Hooren, Michel R. A., Leunis, Nicoline, Brandsma, Dirk S., Dingemans, Anne-Marie C., Kremer, Bernd, Kross, Kenneth W.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Berlin/Heidelberg Springer Berlin Heidelberg 01-11-2016
• Subjects: Adult; Aged; Breath Tests; Carcinoma - diagnosis; Diagnosis, Differential; Electronic Nose; Exhalation; Female; Head and Neck; Head and Neck Neoplasms - diagnosis; Head and Neck Surgery; Humans; Lung Neoplasms - diagnosis; Male; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Middle Aged; Neurosurgery; Otorhinolaryngology; Predictive Value of Tests; Reproducibility of Results; Volatile Organic Compounds; Volatile organic compounds; Lung carcinoma; Diagnosis; Head and neck carcinoma; Electronic nose
• ISSN: 0937-4477; 1434-4726
• DOI: 10.1007/s00405-016-4038-x

Disease specific patterns of volatile organic compounds can be detected in exhaled breath using an electronic nose (e-nose). The aim of this study is to explore whether an e-nose can differentiate between head and neck, and lung carcinoma. Eighty-seven patients received an e-nose measurement before any oncologic treatment. We used PARAFAC/TUCKER3 tensor decomposition for data reduction and an artificial neural network for analysis to obtain binary results; either diagnosed as head and neck or lung carcinoma. Via a leave-one-out method, cross-validation of the data was performed. In differentiating head and neck from lung carcinoma patients, a diagnostic accuracy of 93 % was found. After cross-validation of the data, this resulted in a diagnostic accuracy of 85 %. There seems to be a potential for e-nose as a diagnostic tool in HNC and lung carcinoma. With a fair diagnostic accuracy, an e-nose can differentiate between the two tumor entities.