Axillary ultrasound for predicting response to neoadjuvant treatment in breast cancer patients-a single institution experience.

BACKGROUND: In node-positive breast cancer patients at diagnosis (cN +) that render node-negative after neoadjuvant systemic treatment (NAST), axillary lymph node dissection (ALND) can be avoided in selected cases. Axillary ultrasound (AUS) is most often used for re-staging after NAST. We aimed to determine sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV), and negative predictive value (NPV) of AUS after NAST for predicting nodal response at the Institute of Oncology, Ljubljana. METHODS: Biopsy-confirmed cN + patients consecutively diagnosed at our institution between 2008 and 2021, who received NAST, followed by surgery were identified retrospectively. Only patients that underwent AUS after NAST were included. AUS results were compared to definite nodal histopathology results. We calculated sensitivity, specificity, PPV and NPV of AUS. We also calculated the proportion of patients with false-positive AUS that results in surgical overtreatment (unnecessary ALND). RESULTS: We identified 437 cN + patients. In 244 (55.8%) AUS after NAST was performed. Among those, 42/244 (17.2%) were triple negative (TN), 78/244 (32.0%) Her-2 positive (Her-2 +), and 124/244 (50,8%) luminal Her-2 negative cancers. AUS was negative in 179/244 (73.4%), suspicious/positive in 65/244 (26.6%) (11/42 (26.2%) TN, 19/78 (24.4%) Her-2 + , and 35/124 (28.2%) luminal Her-2 negative cancers). On definite histopathology, nodal complete response (pCR) was observed in 89/244 (36.5%) (19/42 (45.2%) TN, 55/78 (70.5%) Her-2 + , and 15/124 (12.1%) luminal Her-2 negative cancers). Among patients with suspicious/positive AUS, pCR was observed in 20/65 (30.8%) (6/11 (54.5%) TN, 13/19 (68.4%) Her-2 + and 1/35 (2.9%) luminal Her-2 negative cancers). Sensitivity was 29.0%, specificity 77,5%, PPV 69.2%, NPV 38.5%. Specificity and PPV in TN was 68.4% and 45.4%, in Her-2 + 76.4% and 31.6%, in luminal Her-2 negative 93,3% and 97,1%, respectively. CONCLUSION: In approximately half of the patients, AUS falsely predicts nodal response after NAST and may lead to overtreatment in 30% of the cases (ALND). However, AUS has to be interpreted in context with tumor subtype. In luminal Her-2 negative cancers, it has a high PPV and is therefore useful.

Three-dimensional ultrasound evaluation of tongue posture and its impact on articulation disorders in preschool children with anterior open bite.

Background Tongue posture plays an important role in the etiology of anterior open bite (AOB) and articulation disorders, and is crucial for AOB treatment planning and posttreatment stability. Clinical assessment of tongue posture in children is unreliable due to anatomical limitations. The aim of the study was to present functional diagnostics using three-dimensional ultrasound (3DUS) assessment of resting tongue posture in comparison to clinical assessment, and the associations between the improper tongue posture, otorhinolaryngological characteristics, and articulation disorders in preschool children with AOB. Patients and methods A cross-sectional study included 446 children, aged 3-7 years, 236 boys and 210 girls, examined by an orthodontist to detect the prevalence of AOB. The AOB was present in 32 children. The control group consisted of 43 children randomly selected from the participants with normocclusion. An orthodontist, an ear, nose and throat (ENT) specialist and a speech therapist assessed orofacial and ENT conditions, oral habits, and articulation disorders in the AOB group and control group. Tongue posture was also assessed by an experienced radiologist, using 3DUS. The 3DUS assessment of tongue posture was compared to the clinical assessment of orthodontist and ENT specialist. Results The prevalence of AOB was 7.2%. The AOB group and the control group significantly differed regarding improper tongue posture (p < 0.001), and articulation disorders (p < 0.001). In children without articulation disorders from both groups, the improper tongue posture occured less frequently than in children with articulation disorders (p < 0.001). After age adjustment, a statistical regression model showed that the children with the improper tongue posture had higher odds ratios for the presence of AOB (OR 14.63; p < 0.001) than the others. When articulation disorders were included in the model, these odds ratios for the AOB became insignificant (p = 0.177). There was a strong association between the improper tongue posture and articulation disorders (p = 0.002). The 3DUS detected the highest number of children with improper resting tongue posture, though there was no significant difference between the 3DUS and clinical assessments done by orthodontist and ENT specialist. Conclusions The 3DUS has proved to be an objective, non-invasive, radiation free method for the assessment of tongue posture and could become an important tool in functional diagnostics and early rehabilitation in preschool children with speech irregularities and irregular tongue posture and malocclusion in order to enable optimal conditions for articulation development.

Recurrence rate in regional lymph nodes in 737 patients with follicular or Hürthle cell neoplasms.

BACKGROUND: Preoperative ultrasound (US) evaluation of central and lateral neck compartments is recommended for all patients undergoing a thyroidectomy for malignant or suspicious for malignancy cytologic or molecular findings. Our aim was to find out how frequent was recurrence in regional lymph nodes in patients with follicular or Hürthle cell neoplasm and usefulness of preoperative neck US investigation in patients with neoplasm. PATIENTS AND METHODS: Altogether 737 patients were surgically treated because of follicular or Hürthle cell neoplasms from 1995 to 2014 at our cancer comprehensive center, among them 207 patients (163 females, 44 males; mean age 52 years) had thyroid carcinoma. RESULTS: Carcinoma was diagnosed in follicular and Hürthle cell neoplasm in 143/428 and 64/309 of cases, respectively. A recurrence in regional lymph nodes occurred in 12/207 patients (6%) during a median follow-up of 55 months. Among patients with carcinoma a recurrence in regional lymph nodes was diagnosed in follicular and Hürthle cell neoplasms in 2% and 14%, respectively (p = 0.002). Recurrence in regional lymph nodes was diagnosed in 3/428 of all patients with follicular neoplasm and 9/309 of all patients with Hürthle cell neoplasm. CONCLUSIONS: Recurrence in lymph nodes was diagnosed in 0.7% of patients with a preoperative diagnosis of follicular neoplasm and 3% of patients with a Hürthle cell neoplasm. A recurrence in regional lymph nodes is rare in patients with carcinoma and preoperative diagnosis of follicular neoplasm. Preoperative neck ultrasound examination in patients with a follicular neoplasm is probably not useful, but in patients with Hurtle cell neoplasm it may be useful.

Segmentation of hepatic vessels from MRI images for planning of electroporation-based treatments in the liver.

INTRODUCTION: Electroporation-based treatments rely on increasing the permeability of the cell membrane by high voltage electric pulses delivered to tissue via electrodes. To ensure that the whole tumor is covered by the sufficiently high electric field, accurate numerical models are built based on individual patient geometry. For the purpose of reconstruction of hepatic vessels from MRI images we searched for an optimal segmentation method that would meet the following initial criteria: identify major hepatic vessels, be robust and work with minimal user input. MATERIALS AND METHODS: We tested the approaches based on vessel enhancement filtering, thresholding, and their combination in local thresholding. The methods were evaluated on a phantom and clinical data. RESULTS: Results show that thresholding based on variance minimization provides less error than the one based on entropy maximization. Best results were achieved by performing local thresholding of the original de-biased image in the regions of interest which were determined through previous vessel-enhancement filtering. In evaluation on clinical cases the proposed method scored in average sensitivity of 93.68%, average symmetric surface distance of 0.89 mm and Hausdorff distance of 4.04 mm. CONCLUSIONS: The proposed method to segment hepatic vessels from MRI images based on local thresholding meets all the initial criteria set at the beginning of the study and necessary to be used in treatment planning of electroporation-based treatments: it identifies the major vessels, provides results with consistent accuracy and works completely automatically. Whether the achieved accuracy is acceptable or not for treatment planning models remains to be verified through numerical modeling of effects of the segmentation error on the distribution of the electric field.

Role of ultrasound in the preoperative staging of patients with breast cancer.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the ability of axillary ultrasound (US) and US-guided fine-needle aspiration biopsy (FNAB) to detect axillary LN metastases. Between January 2001 and September 2003, axillary US was performed in 165 patients with cytologically or histologically proven breast cancer and clinically non-palpable axillary LNs. In patients with US suspicious LNs, US-guided FNAB was performed and patients with cytologically proven malignant LNs proceeded directly to the ALND. In 49/90 patients with US suspicious LNs, US-guided FNAB was performed. It was positive in 33/49 patients. Definitive histology report revealed LN metastases in 65/165 patients. The sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative predictive value of the US-FNAB, were 84, 91, 97 and 62%. Axillary US in a combination with US-FNAB is a valuable method in preoperative staging of patients with breast cancer. Almost 50% of patients with LN metastases can be spared the second operation. However, it is very much operator-dependent and equipment-dependent.

The role of preoperative ultrasonography in reducing the number of sentinel lymph node procedures in melanoma.

Sentinel lymph node (SLN) biopsy is the most effective method to nodally stage patients with melanoma. However, SLN metastases are an indication for a complete regional lymphadenectomy. The aim of this study was to evaluate the ability of ultrasound (US) and US-guided fine needle aspiration biopsy (US-FNAB) to reduce the number of patients requiring a second surgical procedure. Fifty-seven patients with melanoma underwent preoperative US of the regional lymph nodes before SLN biopsy. In patients with US malignant lymph nodes, US-FNAB was performed. Only patients with cytologically proven lymph node metastases proceeded directly to a complete regional lymphadenectomy, whereas, in all others, SLN biopsy was performed. Fourteen patients (25%) had metastases in the regional lymph nodes. There were 40 benign and 17 malignant US results. US-FNAB was performed in 14 patients. It was positive in three, negative in nine and inadequate sampling was obtained in two. The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value (PPV) and negative predictive value (NPV) of US were 71%, 84%, 59% and 90%, respectively. US of the regional lymph nodes with US-FNAB enables the safe selection of patients who should proceed directly to a complete regional lymphadenectomy. However, the sensitivity and PPV of the method are low.