Comparative study between ultrasound-guided fine needle aspiration cytology of axillary lymph nodes and sentinel lymph node histopathology in early-stage breast cancer

The replacement of sentinel lymph node biopsy (SNB) by ultrasound-guided fine-needle aspiration (US-guided FNA) cytology of axillary lymph nodes is controversial, despite the simplicity and reduced cost of the latter. In the present study, US-guided FNA was performed in 27 patients with early-stage...

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Bibliographic Details
Authors: Cardoso-Coelho, Livio Portela, Borges, Rafael Soares, Alencar, Airlane Pereira, Cardoso-Campos-Verdes, Larysse Maira, da Silva-Sampai, Joao Paulo, Borges, Umbelina Soares, Gebrim, Luiz Henrique [UNIFESP], da Silva, Benedito Borges
Format: article
Status:Published version
Publication Date:2017
Country:Brasil
Institution:Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP)
Repository:Repositório Institucional da UNIFESP
Language:English
OAI Identifier:oai:repositorio.unifesp.br:11600/54607
Online Access:http://dx.doi.org/10.3892/ol.2017.5817
https://repositorio.unifesp.br/handle/11600/54607
Access Level:Open access
Keyword:breast cancer
axillary lymph node
sentinel lymph node
fine-needle aspiration biopsy
Description
Summary:The replacement of sentinel lymph node biopsy (SNB) by ultrasound-guided fine-needle aspiration (US-guided FNA) cytology of axillary lymph nodes is controversial, despite the simplicity and reduced cost of the latter. In the present study, US-guided FNA was performed in 27 patients with early-stage breast cancer for comparison with SNB. Data were analyzed by calculation of sample proportions. Tumor subtypes included invasive ductal carcinoma (85%), invasive lobular carcinoma (7%), and tubular and metaplastic carcinoma (4%). FNA had a sensitivity of 45%, specificity of 100%, positive predictive value of 100% and a negative predictive value of 73%. Axillary lymph node cytology obtained by US guided-FNA in patients with breast cancer had a specificity similar to that of sentinel lymph node histopathology in the presence of axillary node metastases. However, when lymph node cytology is negative, it does not exclude the existence of metastatic implants, due to its low sensitivity in comparison to sentinel lymph node histopathology.

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