Effect of vascular haemoglobin concentrations on ultrasound-guided diffuse optical tomography in differentiating benign from malignant breast lesions.

Objectives: Ultrasound-guided diffuse optical tomography (US-DOT) can potentially detect breast carcinomas by measuring total tumour haemoglobin concentrations (TTHC). The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether vascular haemoglobin concentrations (VHC) affect the ability of US-DOT to distinguish breast carcinomas from benign.

Materials And Methods: In 85 women (97 palpable lesions) referred for core breast biopsy, we measured VHC with a complete blood count and calculated TTHCs for each lesion with US-DOT. Anaemia was defined as a VHC less than 120.0 g/L.

Results: Mean TTHCs were significantly higher in malignant lesions (n = 53) than in benign lesions (n = 44), regardless of whether the lesions were from women with anaemia (TTHC, 248.5 vs. 123.3 μmol/L; P = 0.001) or from those without (TTHC, 229.7 vs. 173.9 μmol/L; P = 0.016). A cut-off TTHC of 155.1 μmol/L provided 81.3 % sensitivity, 81.8 % specificity and 81.5 % accuracy for detecting malignant tumours in women with anaemia and 78.4 % sensitivity, 54.5 % specificity and 67.1 % accuracy for women without. There was no significant difference in sensitivity (P = 0.813), specificity (P = 0.108) and accuracy (P = 0.162) between the anaemic group and the non-anaemic group.

Conclusions: Vascular haemoglobin concentrations did not affect the ability of US-DOT to differentiate breast carcinomas from benign lesions.

Key Points: • US-DOT can differentiate benign from malignant breast lesions by measuring TTHC. • No difference in TTHC between the anaemia and non-anaemia group. • Vascular haemoglobin concentrations do not affect the diagnostic ability of US-DOT.