Adequacy of core needle biopsy specimens and fine-needle aspirates for molecular testing of lung adenocarcinomas.

Objectives: Molecular testing of lung adenocarcinomas for epidermal growth factor (EGFR) mutations and an anaplastic lymphoma kinase (ALK) translocation is important to guide directed therapy with tyrosine kinase inhibitors. The goal of this study was to determine whether transthoracic computed tomography-guided core needle biopsy (CNB) and fine-needle aspiration (FNA) biopsy specimens were equally suitable for molecular testing.

Methods: We determined the percentage of 52 CNB and 120 FNA specimens that contained sufficient paraffin-embedded tumor tissue for EGFR, KRAS, and ALK testing over a period of 2 years.