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World J Gastrointest Oncol. Jul 15, 2025; 17(7): 107670
Published online Jul 15, 2025. doi: 10.4251/wjgo.v17.i7.107670
Diagnostic value of endoscopic ultrasound in staging of pancreatic cancer
Xin Yang, Nan Ge
Xin Yang, Nan Ge, Department of Gastroenterology, Shengjing Hospital of China Medical University, Shenyang 110004, Liaoning Province, China
Author contributions: Ge N and Yang X designed and wrote the manuscript; Ge N reviewed and revised the manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All authors disclosed no conflicts of interests.
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Nan Ge, Department of Gastroenterology, Shengjing Hospital of China Medical University, No. 36 Sanhao Street, Shenyang 110004, Liaoning Province, China. nge@cmu.edu.cn
Received: April 1, 2025
Revised: April 23, 2025
Accepted: June 5, 2025
Published online: July 15, 2025
Processing time: 107 Days and 16.6 Hours
Abstract

Pancreatic cancer is recognized as one of the leading causes of cancer mortality, representing the second most common source of cancer-related deaths within the gastrointestinal domain. Surgical resection is currently the only definitive treatment; however, the subtle emergence of symptoms often leads to a diagnosis at an advanced stage, with merely 10%-15% of patients being eligible for surgical intervention. The primary obstacle to achieving a potential radical resection is the presence of distant metastatic disease or invasion of adjacent major vascular structures. This review aims to highlight the critical role of endoscopic ultrasound in the diagnosis and staging of pancreatic tumors. We systematically searched PubMed, MEDLINE and Web of Science by using ‘pancreatic cancer’ and ‘endoscopic ultrasonography’ as keywords. Relevant studies were reviewed and analyzed. Endoscopic ultrasonography (EUS) is efficient in the diagnosis and staging of pancreatic cancer, past studies reported the accuracy of EUS is 63% to 94% for T-staging and 44% to 82% for N-staging but there are still limitations that need to be comprehensively applied with other diagnostic methods to evaluation of distant metastasis for surgical resectability. Our review aims to reveal the value for the staging of pancreatic cancer.

Keywords: Endoscopic ultrasound; Pancreatic cancer; Staging; Diagnostic value

Core Tip: Pancreatic cancer is a lethal health problem. Most pancreatic cancers asymptomatic in the early stages, without noticeable clinical presentation in the early stage. Surgical resection is the only approach for pancreatic cancer. Endoscopic ultrasonography (EUS) provides precise evaluations of tumor, invasion, and lymph node involvement, but a singular imaging modality appears inadequate for the preoperative staging of pancreatic cancer. Our review aims to reveal the diagnosis and staging of EUS in pancreatic cancer.