Efficacy of TBNA needles for EBUS during fiberoptic bronchoscopy?

Abstract

Conventional transbronchial needle aspiration (cTBNA) biopsy is a diagnostic minimally invasive technique applied using fibreoptic bronchoscopy (FOB) in the evaluation of mediastinal/hilar lymph nodes. With the development of endobronchial ultrasound (EBUS) devices, transbronchial aspiration needles have been revised for use according to the EBUS guidelines. The main aim of this research was to evaluate the diagnostic success of transbronchial aspiration needles that was produced for EBUS when it was applied with FOB instead of conventional TBNA. A retrospective examination was made with the data of 35 patients applied with FOB TBNA, using needles specifically designed for EBUS and 36 patients with conventional TBNA (cTBNA group), for lung cancer staging or the diagnosis of mediastinal lymphadenopathy between November 2018 and November 2019. Seventy-two and sixty procedures performed on 71 patients were included in the study. Diagnostic efficiency for TBNA and cTBNA groups were 91.4% and 83.3%, respectively. Conventional TBNA is still acceptable when the low cost and ease of application are taken into consideration. In conclusion, improvement of current conventional TBNA needles similar to EBUS-TBNA needles for more efficient aspiration capacity could be the first stepto increasing the TBNA diagnostic yield. Nevertheless, further studies are needed to confirm our results.