OBJECTIVETo investigate the clinical value of esophageal mucosal iodine stain during esophagoscopy for patients with early esophageal carcinoma or precancerous lesions without swallowing symptoms, through analyzing the correlation between endoscopic findings and pathological results of biopsy on the suspicious spots.

METHODSFor 366 patients examined by iodine stain during esophagoscopy, the position, size, shape and boundary of all visible unstained lesions were recorded and multiple biopsies were taken on the unstained spots.

RESULTSBefore iodine stain, 462 lesions had been discovered in 366 patients. However, 478 abnormal lesions stained in 341 patients were detected after iodine stain, the remaining 25 gave no abnormal findings. More than 1/3 of patients were found to have more than 2 abnormally stained lesions. 28.4% of them (104 cases) had moderate or severe dysplasia or early esophageal cancer. The sensitivity of iodine stain in this series was 89.8%.

CONCLUSIONIodine stain is very useful in detecting occult early esophageal carcinoma and precancerous lesions. The degree of coloration and the margin of suspicious spots are closely correlated with the pathological results.