Electropotential measurements as a new diagnostic modality for breast cancer.

Background: Proliferative changes in breast epithelium are an intrinsic aspect in the development of breast cancer, and result in regions of epithelial electrical depolarisation within the breast parenchyma, which can extend to the skin surface. Diagnostic information might be obtained from a non-imaging and non-invasive test based on skin-surface electropotentials.

Methods: In 661 women, scheduled for open biopsy at eight European centres, we studied whether measurements of breast electrical activity with surface sensors could distinguish benign from malignant breast disease.

Results of breast conserving therapy for early breast cancer and the role of mammographic follow-up.

Purpose: The following article is a review of 23 years of breast-conserving therapy in our hospital. This study was performed to assess and improve the follow-up care of women with early breast cancer and to evaluate whether or not biannual mammogram is useful.

Methods And Materials: Between 1972 and December 1995, 3072 women with pathological size pT1 and pT2 breast cancer were treated with conservative surgery and radiation therapy.

[Quality assurance by improved cooperation structures. The example of decentralized early detection mammography].

The German Mammography Study investigated into quality assurance measures for screening mammography, proceeding in a decentralised manner and focussing especially on structure, process and outcome of the study. The field phase lasted for three years, and during this period the technology of the equipment used in mammography improved, also to the indicators of process and of early outcome. The annual interval of examinations was well received.

Nodal involvement in cancer of the uterine cervix: value of lymphography and MRI.

In this study the preoperative staging of lymph node involvement in cervical cancer was analyzed retrospectively in 155 cases. All results were correlated with lymph node histology. One hundred and three patients underwent preoperative lymphography.

[Measurement of the distance of the rectal mucosa from a gynecologic afterloading applicator based on the drop in performance of a cobalt-60-source].

Purpose: Assessment of the distance from a gynecological afterloading applicator to the rectum mucosa.

Methods: The appropriate afterloading applicator for HDR-Ir-therapy is used for that purpose. A Co-60-source (370 MBq) with a guiding wire is positioned at the tip of the applicator and then withdrawn in steps of 1 cm.

[Controversial attitude to mammography screening in asymptomatic women between 40 and 50 years of age].

The results of screening studies conducted in the United States and in Europe in females between the ages of 40 and 50 are analysed. It is shown, that the results of this study on mortality reduction are less favourable, the poorer the technique of mammography (foregoing of general two-view mammography) and the longer the time interval between two mammography screenings. Arguments are presented, that are brought forward when declining to perform general mammography screening in this age group.

[Determinants of observer variability in early diagnostic mammography--a ROC analysis].

As part of the German mammographic study, the participating doctors were given test films of 30 histologically confirmed cases. Regarding the indications for biopsy there was good sensitivity (the median amongst 25 doctors was 0.87).

[Results of treatment following breast-saving therapy: analysis of intramammary recurrence].

1,135 patients were subjected to conservation treatment of the breast between 1972 and April 1990. The probability of survival without relapses and metastases is 82.2% (5 years) or 72.

Thermography in the follow-up of breast cancer patients after breast-conserving treatment by tumorectomy and radiation therapy.

It is often suggested in the literature that thermography is able to diagnose a recurrence in the breast after breast-conserving therapy by a rise in breast temperature much earlier than other diagnostic tools, but no thermographic values are presented. The thermographic data of a prospective study of 309 women after breast-conserving therapy were evaluated. Seventeen of these women had an intramammary recurrence.

[Radiotherapy in primary radically operated ovarian cancer].

The basis of primary treatment is consequent surgery. Radiation therapy is not necessary for borderline tumors. An effect has been seen in stages Ib to III with a small amount of post-operative residual tumor.

[Secondary vulvectomy treatment results in local recurrence of a vulvar carcinoma following electron irradiation].

Between 1965 and 1979 vulvectomy was performed in 41 patients because of histologically demonstrated local recurrence of a vulval carcinoma after electron beam therapy. Of the patients thus treated, 36.6% survived more than 3 years and 19.

[Intraductal breast carcinoma. Clinical, x-ray and histological findings and their therapeutic consequences].

116 cases of early ductal breast cancer diagnosed during 1971 to 1981 were analysed. In 65 cases no invasion was detectable. 37 cases showed an early stromal invasion and in 14 cases the invasion was questionable.

[Radiotherapy of vulvar cancer. Treatment results of electron therapy in 446 patients 1956 to 1978].

446 patients with malignant tumour of the vulva were treated from 1956 to 1978. In 432 patients with invasive squamous cell carcinoma, a five-year survival rate of 43.1% was obtained after exclusive exposure to electron radiation.

Treatment of advanced cancers of the cervix uteri with external irradiation alone.

The five year survival rates of 150 patients who were treated by external irradiation alone for cancers of the cervix uteri are presented. Intracavitary radium therapy had been rejected as inappropriate in all of them on account of the size and type of spread of the tumor. The average age of the selected patients was considerably higher than that of control groups.

[Axillary lymph node metastases as first manifestation of occult breast cancers].

Within a period of 8 years 12 women patients were referred to the authors with histologically established lymph node metastases in the axilla without a primary tumour being identified despite careful examination. Subsequent follow-up showed that the only possible cause in these patients was a primarily occult carcinoma of the breast. This rare manifestation of a carcinoma of the breast is discussed on the basis of the case reports and the literature with particular regard to the diagnostic and therapeutic problem involved.

[Modern aspects in radiation therapy of gynaecological malignancies (author's transl)].

Modern trends in radiation therapy of gynaecological malignancies offer the following advantages: optimal doses distribution in combined external and internal therapy, reduction of radium dose, individual design of the radiation field for extend of the tumor, possibility of the extended field irradiation.

[The value of infrared and plate thermography in the early diagnosis of mastocarcinoma (author's transl)].

The inspection and palpation of the breast remains the basis of every breast examination. However, genuine early diagnosis of carcinoma of the breast cannot be achieved by clinical examinations without any supporting investigation. It must be borne in mind that such early diagnosis is the aim of every medical checkup for cancer.

[Proposals for standardizing the image quality of mammography (author's transl)].

The radiography of phantoms is not sufficient to test the image quality of mammography. In addition, patients mammograms have to be evaluated using our proposed quality criteria.