Purpose
This study compares the sensitivity of dedicated breast positron emission tomography (DbPET) and whole body positron emission tomography (WBPET) in detecting invasive breast cancer based on ...tumor size and biology. Further, we explored the relationship between maximum standardized uptake value (SUVmax) of DbPET and biological features of the tumor.
Methods
A total of 639 invasive breast cancer lesions subjected to both DbPET and WBPET before surgery, between January 2016 and May 2019, were included in the study. The sensitivity of DbPET and WBPET in detection and the biology of the tumor according to the clinicopathological features were retrospectively evaluated.
Results
The overall sensitivity of DbPET was higher than that of WBPET (91.4% vs. 80.3%,
p
< 0.001). Subcentimetric tumors were significant (80.9% vs. 54.3%,
p
< 0.001). Regardless of the nuclear grade, DbPET could detect more lesions than WBPET. The SUVmax was positively correlated with tumor size (
R
= 0.395,
p
< 0.001) and the nuclear grade (
p
< 0.001). Luminal A-like breast cancer had significantly lower SUVmax values than the other subtypes (
p
< 0.001).
Conclusions
DbPET is superior to WBPET in the detection of subcentimetric, low-grade breast cancers. Further, by using SUVmax, DbPET can distinguish luminal A-like breast cancer from the other subtypes.
In this report, a hand-held impulse-radar breast cancer detector is presented and the detectability of malignant breast tumors is demonstrated in the clinical test at Hiroshima University Hospital, ...Hiroshima, Japan. The core functional parts of the detector consist of 65-nm technology complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) integrated circuits covering the ultrawideband width from 3.1 to 10.6 GHz, which enable the generation and transmission of Gaussian monocycle pulse (GMP) with the pulse width of 160 ps and single port eight throw (SP8T) switching matrices for controlling the combination of 4 × 4 cross-shaped dome antenna array. The detector is designed to be placed on the breast with the patient in the supine position. The detectability of malignant tumors is confirmed in excised breast tissues after total mastectomy surgery. The three-dimensional positions of the tumors in the imaging results are consistent with the results of histopathology analysis. The clinical tests are conducted by a clinical doctor for five patients at the hospital. The malignant tumors include invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC) and ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS). The final confocal imaging results are consistent with those of Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI), demonstrating the feasibility of the hand-held impulse-radar detector for malignant breast tumors.
Purpose
Febrile neutropenia (FN) incidence during docetaxel and cyclophosphamide (TC) chemotherapy, known as a high-risk regimen, differs among countries. The role of prophylactic granulocyte ...colony-stimulating factor (G-CSF) in FN is unclear. This study aimed to investigate FN frequency and relative dose intensity (RDI) of TC chemotherapy in patients with breast cancer and identify the correct population requiring prophylactic G-CSF.
Methods
In total, 205 patients with breast cancer were scheduled for TC chemotherapy (docetaxel/cyclophosphamide 75/600 mg/m
2
, every 3 weeks, 4 cycles) as adjuvant chemotherapy. Trastuzumab (8 mg/kg; continued with 6 mg/kg) was administrated intravenously for human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-positive cancer. Fifty-five patients received primary prophylactic measures (G-CSF: 20 and antibiotics: 35). We investigated the frequency of FN and hospitalization, RDI, and the factors related to FN, adverse events, hospitalization, and RDI.
Results
FN occurred in 70 patients (35.7%). FN incidence was noted in 41.1% without any prophylactic measures and in 5.0% with prophylactic G-CSF. In multivariate analysis, the independent risk factors of FN were older age (≥ 60 years,
P
= 0.017) and without primary prophylactic G-CSF (
P
= 0.011). Eleven patients (5.6%) were hospitalized of which 8 (72.7%) were elderly. The median RDIs of docetaxel and cyclophosphamide were 96.7% and 99.7%, respectively.
Conclusion
FN frequency during TC chemotherapy was high, and primary prophylactic G-CSF reduced FN incidence. Primary prophylactic G-CSF is an effective therapy for preventing FN during TC chemotherapy. However, prophylactic G-CSF should be considered for elderly patients based on the low hospitalization rate and the high RDI.
The classification according to uptake patterns and metabolic parameters on ring-type dedicated breast positron emission tomography (dbPET) is useful for detecting breast cancer. This study ...investigated the performance of dbPET for incidental findings that were not detected by mammography and ultrasonography. In 1,076 patients with breast cancer who underwent dbPET, 276 findings were incidentally diagnosed before treatment. Each finding was categorized as focus (uptake size ≤ 5 mm), mass (> 5 mm), or non-mass (multiple uptake) according to uptake patterns. Non-mass uptakes were additionally classified based on their distributions as-linear, focal, segmental, regional, or diffuse. Thirty-two findings (11.6%) were malignant and 244 (88.4%) were benign. Visually, 227 (82.3%) findings were foci, 7 (2.5%) were masses, and 42 (15.2%) were non-masses. Malignant rates of focus, mass, and non-mass were 9.7%, 28.6%, and 19.0%, respectively. In the non-mass findings, 23 were regional and diffuse distributions, and presented as benign lesions. Focus uptake with low lesion-to-background ratio (LBR) and no hereditary risk were relatively low (2.7%) in breast cancer. In multivariate analysis, LBR and hereditary risk were significantly associated with breast cancer (p = 0.006 and p = 0.013, respectively). Uptake patterns, LBR, and hereditary risk are useful for predicting breast cancer risk in incidental dbPET findings.
Emerging evidence indicates that small RNAs, including microRNAs (miRNAs) and their isoforms (isomiRs), and transfer RNA fragments (tRFs), are differently expressed in breast cancer (BC) and can be ...detected in blood circulation. Circulating small RNAs and small RNAs in extracellular vesicles (EVs) have emerged as ideal markers in small RNA‐based applications for cancer detection. In this study, we first undertook small RNA sequencing to assess the expression of circulating small RNAs in the serum of BC patients and cancer‐free individuals (controls). Expression of 3 small RNAs, namely isomiR of miR‐21‐5p (3′ addition C), miR‐23a‐3p and tRF‐Lys (TTT), was significantly higher in BC samples and was validated by small RNA sequencing in an independent cohort. Our constructed model using 3 small RNAs showed high diagnostic accuracy with an area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.92 and discriminated early‐stage BCs at stage 0 from control. To test the possibility that these small RNAs are released from cancer cells, we next examined EVs from the serum of BC patients and controls. Two of the 3 candidate small RNAs were identified, and shown to be abundant in EVs of BC patients. Interestingly, these 2 small RNAs are also more abundantly detected in culture media of breast cancer cell lines (MCF‐7 and MDA‐MB‐231). The same tendency in selective elevation seen in total serum, serum EV, and EV derived from cell culture media could indicate the efficiency of this model using total serum of patients. These findings indicate that small RNAs serve as significant biomarkers for BC detection.
EV small RNA in breast cancer can be found in serum small RNA biomarker.
Background/Aim: The maximum standardized uptake value (SUVmax) obtained using 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose (FDG) positron emission tomography (PET)/computed tomography (CT) is presumed to indicate tumor ...and active immune cells in the tumor immune microenvironment (TIME) based on their glycolysis activity. Therefore, this study investigated whether the metabolic parameter SUVmax could provide information regarding TIME in triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC) patients. Patients and Methods: Fifty-four patients with TNBC underwent FDG PET/CT before neoadjuvant chemotherapy. Pretreatment biopsy specimens were pathologically evaluated. Expression statuses of CD8, forkhead box P3 (FOXP3), programmed cell death-1 (PD-1), and programmed cell death-ligand 1 (PD-L1) were assessed by immunohistochemistry. The relationships between immunological factors, including the tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte (TIL) grade and SUVmax or pathological complete response (pCR), were investigated. Results: CD8, FOXP3, PD-1, and PD-L1 were high in 15 (27.8%), 39 (72.2%), 18 (33.3%), and 26 (48.2%) patients, respectively. SUVmax was significantly correlated with tumor size, Ki-67 labeling index, and CD8/FOXP3 ratio. Multiple linear regression analysis indicated that tumor size and the CD8/FOXP3 ratio predicted SUVmax. Seventeen patients (31.5%) achieved a pCR; TILs, the CD8/FOXP3 ratio, PD-1, and PD-L1 were significantly correlated with pCR rate. Multivariate analysis indicated that the CD8/FOXP3 ratio was the only independent predictive factor for pCR. Conclusion: SUVmax could provide metabolic information regarding TIME for TNBC patients and might be beneficial for formulating a treatment strategy and predicting pCR after neoadjuvant chemotherapy.
The objective of this paper is to investigate the detectability of breast tumors having various histological types in excised breast tissues of total mastectomy. The tumor images measured by a ...portable impulse-radio-ultra-wideband (IR-UWB)-radar-based breast cancer detector are compared with both pathological images and images of dedicated breast positron emission tomography. It is found that the detector can detect invasive-ductal-carcinomas and extensive intraductal component in the dense breast. The density of the breast has a correlation to the effective permittivity derived from the reconstructed confocal images. The results show that the IR-UWB-radar-based breast cancer detector has a potential as a portable modality for early-stage breast cancer screening.
Information regarding patients who were treated for breast cancer in 2018 was extracted from the National Clinical Database (NCD), which is run by Japanese physicians. This database continues from ...1975, created by the Japanese Breast Cancer Society (JBCS). A total of 95,620 breast cancer cases were registered. The demographics, clinical characteristics, pathology, surgical treatment, adjuvant chemotherapy, adjuvant endocrine therapy, and radiation therapy of Japanese breast cancer patients were summarized. We made comparisons with other reports to reveal the characteristics of our database. We also described some features in Japanese breast cancer that changed over time. The unique characteristics of breast cancer patients in Japan may provide guidance for future research and improvement in healthcare services.
Aim: To investigate whether tumor-infiltrating lymphocyte (TIL) scoring based on 18F-fluorodeoxyglucose positron-emission tomography/computed tomography (FDG PET/CT) can predict the pathological ...response to neoadjuvant chemotherapy. Patients and Methods: A total of 261 patients with breast cancer underwent complete resection after neoadjuvant chemotherapy. PET-TIL score was calculated using tumor size, Ki-67 labeling index, and maximum standardized uptake value (SUVmax) on FDG PET/CT. The efficacy of the PET-TIL score in predicting the pathological complete response (pCR) was retrospectively evaluated. Results: pCR rates were 11.4%, 58.6%, and 38.8% in luminal, human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2)-positive, and triple-negative breast cancer, respectively. The corresponding median PET-TIL scores were 28, 37, and 45. pCR rates were 20.0% and 44.2% in the low and high PET-TIL score groups, respectively (p<0.001). HER2-positive and triple-negative subtypes and high PET-TIL score were independent predictors for pCR. Conclusion: PET-TIL score can predict pCR after neoadjuvant chemotherapy in breast cancer.
Considering the difficulty in detecting primary breast cancers using whole-body positron emission tomography (WBPET) owing to its limited spatial resolution, we aimed to evaluate the detectability of ...breast cancer by ring-type dedicated breast PET (DbPET) on the World Health Organization (WHO) histological classification in comparison with WBPET.
A total of 938 patients with breast cancer underwent WBPET and ring-type DbPET, and 1021 lesions were histologically assessed based on the WHO classification of tumors of the breast. The findings of WBPET and DbPET were retrospectively evaluated and compared.
The size-related sensitivity of DbPET was superior to that of WBPET for subcentimetric tumors (81.9% vs. 52.4%, P < 0.001). The histological distribution was as follows: 11 lobular carcinoma in situ, 158 ductal carcinoma in situ, 738 infiltrating duct carcinoma not otherwise specified (NOS), 12 lobular carcinoma NOS, 40 mucinous adenocarcinoma, 13 tubular carcinoma, 36 invasive breast carcinoma others, and 13 papillary neoplasms. WBPET had low sensitivity for lobular carcinoma in situ, ductal carcinoma in situ, lobular carcinoma NOS, mucinous adenocarcinoma, and tubular carcinoma. DbPET showed improved sensitivity for all the above except lobular and tubular carcinoma. The maximum standardized uptake values (SUVmax) of DbPET were significantly higher than those of WBPET for histological types, excluding lobular carcinoma in situ. The SUVmax of papillary neoplasms was high regardless of low-grade histology and Ki-67 labeling index.
DBPET was found to have high sensitivity and SUVmax values for all histologic types that showed low sensitivity of detection on WBPET, except lobular carcinoma in situ.
•Detection of primary breast cancer by dedicated breast PET was evaluated based on the WHO classification.•Dedicated breast PET showed high sensitivity and SUVmax values for all breast cancer histologic types that showed a low sensitivity of detection on whole-body PET, except lobular carcinoma in situ.•Dedicated breast PET findings represent histology-specific features.