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Swartz HM, Flood AB, Schaner PE, Halpern H, Williams BB, Pogue BW, Gallez B, Vaupel P. How best to interpret measures of levels of oxygen in tissues to make them effective clinical tools for care of patients with cancer and other oxygen-dependent pathologies. Physiol Rep 2020; 8:e14541. [PMID: 32786045 PMCID: PMC7422807 DOI: 10.14814/phy2.14541] [Citation(s) in RCA: 16] [Impact Index Per Article: 4.0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Download PDF] [Figures] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 04/23/2020] [Revised: 07/01/2020] [Accepted: 07/01/2020] [Indexed: 02/07/2023] Open
Abstract
It is well understood that the level of molecular oxygen (O2 ) in tissue is a very important factor impacting both physiology and pathological processes as well as responsiveness to some treatments. Data on O2 in tissue could be effectively utilized to enhance precision medicine. However, the nature of the data that can be obtained using existing clinically applicable techniques is often misunderstood, and this can confound the effective use of the information. Attempts to make clinical measurements of O2 in tissues will inevitably provide data that are aggregated over time and space and therefore will not fully represent the inherent heterogeneity of O2 in tissues. Additionally, the nature of existing techniques to measure O2 may result in uneven sampling of the volume of interest and therefore may not provide accurate information on the "average" O2 in the measured volume. By recognizing the potential limitations of the O2 measurements, one can focus on the important and useful information that can be obtained from these techniques. The most valuable clinical characterizations of oxygen are likely to be derived from a series of measurements that provide data about factors that can change levels of O2 , which then can be exploited both diagnostically and therapeutically. The clinical utility of such data ultimately needs to be verified by careful studies of outcomes related to the measured changes in levels of O2 .
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Affiliation(s)
- Harold M Swartz
- Department of Radiology, Dartmouth Medical School, Hanover, NH, USA
- Department of Medicine, Section of Radiation Oncology, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, Lebanon, NH, USA
- Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, USA
| | - Ann Barry Flood
- Department of Radiology, Dartmouth Medical School, Hanover, NH, USA
| | - Philip E Schaner
- Department of Medicine, Section of Radiation Oncology, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, Lebanon, NH, USA
| | - Howard Halpern
- Department Radiation and Cellular Oncology, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL, USA
| | - Benjamin B Williams
- Department of Radiology, Dartmouth Medical School, Hanover, NH, USA
- Department of Medicine, Section of Radiation Oncology, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, Lebanon, NH, USA
- Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, USA
| | - Brian W Pogue
- Thayer School of Engineering, Dartmouth College, Hanover, NH, USA
- Department of Surgery, Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center, Lebanon, NH, USA
| | - Bernard Gallez
- Louvain Drug Research Institute, Université catholique de Louvain, Brussels, Belgium
| | - Peter Vaupel
- Department Radiation Oncology, University Medical Center, University of Freiburg, Freiburg, Germany
- German Cancer Center Consortium (DKTK) Partner Site Freiburg, German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ), Heidelberg, Germany
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