Utility of Tru-Cut Biopsy of Breast Lesions - An Experience in a Regional Cancer Center of a Developing Country.

Introduction: Tru-cut Needle Biopsy (TCB) is an integral part of triple assessment of breast cancer, which includes clinical assessment, mammography and TCB or Core Needle Biopsy (CNB). The technique is reliable, simple, and reproducible, and inexpensive, which can be adapted even for low-income group of patients and in developing countries.

Aim: This study was done to establish the efficacy of TCB of palpable breast lesions in a developing country where mammography is not possible in all cases.

Materials And Methods: A retrospective analysis of 892 TCBs was done in AH Regional Cancer Centre, Cuttack, Odisha, India where TCBs were performed in patients presenting to outpatient department with palpable breast lesions. The H&E stained sections were interpreted by pathologists of the same centre. Diagnosis was classified into different categories. Immunohistochemistry (IHC) for Estrogen Receptor (ER), Progesterone Receptor (PR) and Her-2/neu was done and interpreted by Allred scoring system.

Results: A total 892 TCBs were analysed with 23 repeat TCBs. There were 13 (1.4%) male patients. A total of 747 cases (83.6%) were diagnosed as malignant, including 735 carcinomas, nine malignant phyllodes tumour, two angiosarcoma and one case of Non-Hodgkin' Lymphoma (NHL). It was possible to diagnose special histological types such as lobular carcinoma, metaplastic carcinoma and mucinous carcinoma on TCB. A total of 21 cases were diagnosed as carcinoma on repeat biopsy. Eight of the 735 TCBs diagnosed as carcinoma were bilateral breast cancers, hence actual number of carcinoma cases were 727. IHC was done successfully on the paraffin blocks in 260 cases. In this series out of 727 patients of carcinomas 30% were in young, i.e., below 40 years of age, including four cases of carcinoma below 20 years. There were no false positive case in this study giving a specificity of 100% and sensitivity was 97%.

Conclusion: TCBs are well tolerated by patients, can be done in OPDs and reduce cost. It is possible to give histological diagnosis of carcinoma, lymphoma, phyllodes tumour and sarcomas on TCBs. The paraffin blocks of TCBs can be used for IHC study which helps the oncologists for preoperative adjuvant therapy.