Background: Sentinel lymph node biopsy (SLNB) reduces the morbidity of axillary clearance and is the standard of care for patients with clinically node-negative breast cancer. The ability to analyse the sentinel node during surgery enables a decision to be made whether to proceed to full axillary clearance during primary surgery, thus avoiding a second procedure in node-positive patients.Methods: Current evidence for intraoperative sentinel node analysis following SLNB in breast cancer was reviewed and evaluated, based on articles obtained from a MEDLINE search using the terms 'sentinel node', 'intra-operative' and 'breast cancer'.Results and conclusion: Current methods for evaluating the sentinel node during surgery include cytological and histological techniques. Newer quantitative molecular assays have been the subject of much recent clinical research. Pathological techniques of intraoperative SLNB analysis such as touch imprint cytology and frozen section have a high specificity, but a lower and more variably reported sensitivity. Molecular techniques are potentially able to sample a greater proportion of the sentinel node, and could have higher sensitivity.
Many centres are now seeing increasing numbers of patients with malignant mesothelioma. This presents pathologists involved in making the diagnosis with a number of problems, which can be divided into those encountered in making the distinction between mesothelioma and benign changes and those experienced in separating mesotheliomas from other types of epithelial and connective tissue tumours. Immunohistochemistry plays a major role in helping to make the diagnosis, but it should be interpreted with due regard to the clinical setting and radiological features, and with a knowledge of the wide morphological variations seen in mesothelioma. This review identifies some of these problems and addresses the uses and limitations of immunohistochemistry in different situations. It includes a discussion of some of the less common variants of mesothelioma and other pleural‐based tumours that enter into the differential diagnosis.
#3118 Background: Dasatinib (SprycelR; BMS-354825) is a potent orally-available inhibitor of Src-family kinases and other kinases with anti-proliferative, anti-osteoclastic and anti-metastatic activity demonstrated pre-clinically. Expression profiling suggested that basal-like cancers may be preferentially sensitive to dasatinib. Methods: A Phase II single-agent trial of dasatinib, using a continuous schedule, was performed in patients with advanced triple-negative (as proxy for basal-like) breast cancers. Subjects were required to have measurable locally-advanced or metastatic triple-negative (ER/PR-negative, Her2-normal) disease and prior anthracycline and/or taxane therapy. A 2-stage Gehan design was adopted, with RECIST-defined response as primary endpoint; subjects discontinued for toxicity were considered non-responders. The original dasatinib dose of 100 mg BID (n=21) was reduced to 70 mg BID (n=23) to improve tolerability. Biomarkers were analyzed in tumor and plasma samples obtained for PK analysis. Results: From 12/06 through 12/07, 44 subjects were treated at 14 institutions: median age 55 yrs, median time from diagnosis 30 mo, prior therapy for advanced disease in 29 (66%). Of 43 response-evaluable subjects, 7 discontinued for toxicity prior to on-study assessment. Of 36 subjects with radiographic assessment, there were 2 confirmed PR [1 continues >1 year + 1 discontinued for intolerance at week 16] plus 2 SD lasting >16 weeks. Four additional subjects had transient clinical benefit reflected by improvement in bone pain (anecdotal) or short-term tumor shrinkage (reductions of 11 - 29%). Tolerability was improved at a dose of 70 mg compared with 100 mg BID. In preliminary analysis, fewer subjects experienced any serious adverse event (13% at 70 mg BID vs 48% at 100 mg BID), fewer reported Grade 3 toxicity, including gastrointestinal (10% vs 26%), pleural effusion (4% vs 9%), generalized edema (0% vs 9%) or pericardial effusion (0% vs 9%), and fewer had dasatinib dose reduction (24% vs 61%). Fatigue, myalgia/arthralgia and headache were comparable at the two doses. No Grade 4 drug-related events occurred. Grade 3-4 abnormal laboratory values were uncommon. Biomarker and PK data will be presented. Conclusions: Modest but encouraging single-agent activity was observed with dasatinib in patients with advanced triple-negative breast cancers, with clinical benefit rate of 9.3% (4/43). Future studies are warranted to address optimal dose and schedule of dasatinib in combination with chemotherapy for this challenging tumor type. Citation Information: Cancer Res 2009;69(2 Suppl):Abstract nr 3118.
Factors predicting the sentinel node metastases in T1 breast cancer tumor: An analysis of 1416 cases AimTo determine the factors associated with the metastatic involvement of sentinel lymph node (SLN) biopsy in patients with early breast cancer. Study designThis was a retrospective study of patients with T1 invasive breast cancer who underwent SLN ConclusionIt appears reasonable to avoid axillary lymph node dissection in older patients with T1a tumors of good histopathological type and in the absence of lymphovascular invasion.
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