THE ROLE OF INTRAOPERATIVE FROZEN SECTION DIAGNOSIS OF SENTINEL LYMPH NODE IN EARLY BREAST CANCER

Dr. Most. Fatema Khatun*, Dr. Mirza Kamrul Zahid, Dr. Md. Zahangir Alam and Dr. Rebeka Sulatana

ABSTRACT

Background: Sentinel lymph node biopsy (SLNB) is now the standard of care for axillary staging in patients with clinical lymph node negative breast cancer. Objective: In this study our main goal is to evaluate the role of intraoperative frozen section diagnosis of sentinel lymph node in early breast cancer. Method: This cross-sectional study was performed at Tertiary medical college and hospital from 2019 to 2020 involving 50 cases of invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC), and 50 cases of invasive lobular carcinoma (ILC) who undergone intraoperative frozen section analysis and confirmatory permanent section analyses that was performed on at least one SLN during definitive breast cancer surgery were included as a sample population. Results: During the study most of the patients belong to 32-42 years age group, 62.5%. Mean age was 36±6.28 years. Besides that, 75% patients married in 13-17 years age and got 1st pregnant by 14-18 years old. 90% cases had estrogen receptor followed by 85% cases had Progesterone receptor, 40% had HER2 positive status. Mean tumor size 18.3mm. In invasive lobular carcinoma group, 30% and 40% positive cases were found in frozen section analysis and permanent of SLN whereas Invasive ductal carcinoma group it was 28% and 31%. In addition, during evaluation about finding of a positive sentinel lymph node, no statistically significant difference was noted in any of variables for ILC versus IDC patients. Conclusion: We can conclude that, frozen section analysis of all SLNs during breast cancer surgery in patients should continue to be the standard of care in order to reduce the risk of the need for a later, separate axillary lymph node dissection.

Keywords: Breast cancer, Sentinel lymph node (SLN) biopsy, Invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC), Invasive lobular carcinoma (ILC).