Radiofrequency ablation of early breast cancer followed by delayed surgical resection – A promising alternative to breast-conserving surgery

Abstract

To examine the radiofrequency ablation (RFA) reliability in early breast cancer, we performed RFA followed by delayed surgical resection on 41 patients with invasive or non-invasive breast carcinoma less than 2 cm. MRI scans were obtained before ablation and resection. Excised specimens were examined pathologically by haematoxylin-eosin and nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide-diaphorase staining. 40 patients completed 1 RFA session, which was sufficient to achieve complete tumour cell death. Overall complete ablation rate was 87.8% (36/41). There were no treatment-related complications other than that of a superficial burn in 1 case. After RFA, the tumour was no longer enhanced on MRI in 25/26 (96.2%) cases. Residual cancer, which was suspected on MRI in 1 case, was confirmed pathologically. MRI could be an applicable modality to evaluate therapeutic effect. RFA could be an alternate local treatment option to breast-conserving surgery for early breast cancer.

Comparison of four radiofrequency ablation systems at two target volumes in an ex vivo bovine liver model

“…It may be particularly useful for treating patients with inoperable lesions or contraindications to open surgery. Since its introduction, percutaneous ablation has been established as an effective and safe treatment (1,2), especially in patients with primary and secondary malignancies of the liver (3,4), the kidney (5, 6), the lung (7,8), and the breast (9,10).…”

Image-Guided Ablation in Breast Cancer Treatment

“…[30][31][32][33][34][35] The electrode is attached to a radiofrequency generator generally operating in the range of 200 W at 400-800 kHz. The electrode induces current in the tissue adjacent to the electrode, and the heating of the tissue is because of resistive (Joule) heating via ionic agitation.…”

Minimally invasive ablative techniques in the treatment of breast cancer: a systematic review and meta-analysis

“…A total of 63 articles matched the selection criteria. The 63 articles included 16 feasibility studies [13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28], 12 phase I studies [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38][39][40], nine phase II studies [41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49], three comparative studies [50][51][52], one retrospective study [53], and four randomised controlled trials [54][55][56]. In 18 studies the type of study was not reported [8,[57][58][59][60][61][62][63][64]…”

“…The second study by Dooley et al [54] included incomplete data addresses (attrition bias; short-and longer-term outcomes missing) and all studies were free of selective reporting (selection bias) or other biases. [16,65,69]. A combination of follow-up and immediate or delayed surgical excision was performed in two studies (49 patients).…”

“…Seven items of the STROBE statement [11] were used for quality assessment of the included cohort studies ( [16,32,65,69], a group of patients underwent immediate surgical excision of the tumour and the remaining patients were followed up until surgical excision. In five studies [21,24,49,59,63], patients withdrew from the study during or after treatment and in another six studies [15,26,44,48,49,72] patients withdrew before the start of the treatment.…”