Affiliation:
1. Pathology Department, Faculty of Medicine, Minia University, Egypt
2. Oncologic Pathology at South Egypt Cancer Institute, Assiut University, Egypt
3. Oncologic Surgery at South Egypt Cancer Institute, Assiut University, Egypt
Abstract
Background
Currently, two methods are commonly used for intraoperative examination of the sentinel lymph nodes (SLNs) biopsy in breast cancer (BC); imprint cytology (IC) and frozen section (FS).
Aim
Assessing the outcomes of the intraoperative SLN IC evaluation and comparing them to those of FS.
Methods
Eighty-seven patients have been diagnosed with T1-T2 BC. Sentinel nodes were detected using the blue dye injection technique intraoperatively. From each SLN, two slides of touch imprint were provided for imprint cytology evaluation and excised SLNs were then sent for frozen section.
Results
Histological examination of SLNs revealed 10 positive cases and 77 negative cases. Regarding IC, positive SLNs were detected in 8 cases and 79 case showed negative results. For FS, positive SLNs were detected in 11 case and 76 case were negative. Regarding IC, the sensitivity and specificity were 60% and 97.4%, respectively, whereas the sensitivity and specificity reach 90% and 97.4% for FS. Overall accuracy was 93.1% for IC and 96.6% for FS.
Conclusion
Intraoperative SLN diagnosis by imprint cytology in many aspects, could be comparable to that obtained from FS examination. Imprint cytology is simple, fast, easily performed, inexpensive, and highly accurate way of intraoperative SLN diagnosis in BC patients.