What is Histolog?? Well, now that intra operative margin assessment is a such a hot topic in prostate cancer surgery after the Neurosafe RCT read-out, we thought we would dive into one of the other new technologies for doing something similar, but without the pragmatic challenges of frozen section.  The idea is to assess the surgical margin of the prostate at the time of surgery to improve nerve sparing and sexual function for patients.

We are joined by Professor Greg Shaw (University College London, UK), PI of the Neurosafe Proof trial, which we already featured following their Lancet Oncology paper in March 2025,  and our colleague Professor Nathan Lawrentschuk (Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, AUS), who is leading a study of the Histolog device here in Melbourne. We chat first about Neurosafe and why intra-operative margin assessment is important, and then dive into Histolog which Greg has some experience with. 

Histolog uses confocal laser microscopy to assess the prostate specimen at the time of surgery, with a similar principle to frozen section analysis as used in the Neurosafe technique. However Histolog offers a lot more convenience and removes some of the practical barriers we face with frozen section, which are barriers to implementation. But is it as good as frozen section? Join your usual hosts Declan Murphy and Renu Eapen to find out more. 

Many thanks to our Silver Partners, Device Technologies, who are distributing the Histolog technology here in Australia, and to Samantree who are the manufacturers of the Histolog device. 

This episode better enjoyed on our YouTube channel (if you don't mind some surgical scenes)!

Links
Previous GU Cast on Neurosafe with Greg Shaw and colleagues
Histolog device manufacturer website