Optimal mediastinal staging in non-small cell lung cancer: What is the role of TEMLA and VAMLA?

On the basis of the evidence currently available, it may be concluded that VAMLA and TEMLA have no contemporarily use in the routine mediastinal staging of lung cancer. This is because of their invasiveness and - at least for TEMLA - high risk of complications and mortality, which renders it unacceptable as a diagnostic procedure, and also due to the development of equally accurate, but far less invasive techniques, i.e. EBUS-NA and EUS-NA.