Clinical trials

The goal of this clinical trial is to improve the surgical treatment of patients with oral cancer. We will explore whether the use of surgeon performed ultrasound during these surgeries result in better tumor removal. We hypothesize that using intraoperative ultrasound to assist the resection results in more frequent clear surgical margins in oral cancer surgeries compared to standard methods. This improvement is associated with a reduced need for post-operative adjuvant therapies such as radiotherapy and reoperation, lower mortality rates, lower cancer recurrence, and enhanced quality of life for patients undergoing surgery for oral cancer. Participants will be randomized to either the control or intervention group: * Control group will receive standard treatment for oral cancer. * Intervention group will in addition to the standard treatment have surgery performed using ultrasound to guide the resection and evaluate resection margins intraoperatively. Outcomes: * Number of free surgical margins between control and intervention group. * Intraoperative surgeon assessed surgical margins compared to final histology report. * Dysphagia and quality of life questionnaires. * Recurrence rates. * Mortality rates. All participant will be followed-up at 3 months and 12 months with: * MDADI dysphagia questionnaire * EORTC head and neck cancer quality of life questionnaire * Follow-up on recurrrence and mortality.

Introduction The current diagnostic approach for patients with suspected oropharyngeal cancer involves a combination of clinical examination, tissue sampling, and relevant cross-sectional imaging. Previous studies have shown that transoral and cervical ultrasound (US) of the palatine and lingual tonsils has a better diagnostic accuracy than clinical investigation and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) in patients with suspected oropharyngeal cancer, but it has not been established whether adding this scan to the diagnostic workup has a clinical impact. Methods A randomized controlled study, including 170 patients at four different Head and Neck Hospital departments in Denmark. One group receives standard diagnostics (control group), and the other group receives standard diagnostics supplemented by transoral and cervical ultrasound of the lingual and palatine tonsils. The diagnostic accuracy, number of correct biopsies, number of imaging modalities ordered, and time to final diagnosis are noted. Conclusion This randomized controlled study examines whether the implementation of transoral and cervical ultrasound of the palatine and lingual tonsils in patients with suspected oropharyngeal cancer will improve the diagnostic accuracy and have a clinical impact. This concerns more accurate initial diagnoses, more correct biopsies, fewer unnecessary scans, and fewer visits to the outpatient clinic.