Ductal lavage of cancerous and unaffected breasts: procedure success rate and cancer detection.

Objective: To evaluate ductal lavage (DL) performance in women with known breast cancer and to assess cell yield from contralateral high-risk breasts.

Study Design: Women with newly diagnosed breast cancer were offered study participation. They underwent bilateral nipple aspiration, followed by DL of those ducts demonstrating nipple aspiration fluid (NAF) production.

Cytokeratin-positive cells in the bone marrow of breast cancer patients and noncancer donors.

Detection of disseminated tumor cells in the bone marrow may provide important prognostic information in breast cancer patients. With few exceptions the number of stained cells scored as cancer is very low; there may be only 1 cell per slide. This makes definitive interpretation of cancer in marrow challenging.

The detection of isolated tumor cells in bone marrow comparing bright-field immunocytochemistry and multicolor immunofluorescence.

Background: The detection of isolated tumor cells in bone marrow by immunocytochemistry (ICC) has been reported to predict progression of early-stage breast cancer. The most common staining procedure uses bright-field ICC with cytokeratin (CK) antibodies to label isolated tumor cells. However, this method can result in false-positive staining events.