Surgical attitudes toward preoperative breast magnetic resonance imaging in women with early-stage breast cancer.

Background: Preoperative breast magnetic resonance imaging (mri) is commonly requested by surgeons in the initial workup of women with breast cancer; however, its use is controversial. We performed a survey of breast cancer surgeons across Canada to investigate current knowledge about, attitudes to, and self-reported use of preoperative breast mri in a publicly funded health care system in light of the limited evidence to support it. Methods: All identified general surgeons in Canada were mailed a survey instrument designed to probe current practice and knowledge of published trials. Results: Of 403 responding surgeons, 233 (58%) indicated that they performed breast cancer surgery. Of those 233, 218 (94%) had access to breast mri and completed the entire survey. Overall, 54.6% of responding surgeons felt that breast mri was useful in surgical planning, and more than half (58.3%) indicated that their frequency of use was likely to increase over the next 5 years. Surgeons found preoperative mri most useful in detecting mammographically occult disease (71.5% of respondents) and in planning for breast-conserving surgery (57.3%). The main limitations reported were timely access to mri (51%) and false positives (36.7%). Responses suggest a knowledge gap in awareness of published trials in breast mri. Conclusions: Our study found that, in early-stage breast cancer, self-reported use of mri by breast cancer surgeons in Canada varied widely. Reported indications did not align with published data, and significant gaps in self-reported knowledge of the data were evident. Our results would support the development and dissemination of guidelines to optimize use of mri.

Systematic review of radioguided surgery for non-palpable breast cancer.

BACKGROUND: This systematic review examines whether radioguided localization surgery (RGL) (radioguided occult lesion localization - ROLL and radioguided seed localization - RSL) for non-palpable breast cancer lesions produces lower positive margin rates than standard wire-guided localization surgery. METHODS: We performed a comprehensive literature review to identify clinical studies using either ROLL or RSL. Included studies examined invasive or in situ BC and reported pathologically assessed margin status or specimen volume/weight. Two reviewers independently assessed study eligibility and quality and abstracted relevant data on patient and surgical outcomes. Quantitative data analyses were performed. RESULTS: Fifty-two clinical studies on ROLL (n = 46) and RSL (n = 6) were identified. Twenty-seven met our inclusion criteria: 12 studies compared RGL to WGL and 15 studies were single cohorts using RGL. Ten studies were included in the quantitative analyses. Data for margin status and re-operation rates from 4 randomized controlled trials (RCT; n = 238) and 6 cohort studies were combined giving a combined odds ratio (OR) of 0.367 and 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.277 to 0.487 (p < 0.001) for margins status and OR 0.347, 95% CI: 0.250 to 0.481 (p < 0.001) for re-operation rates. CONCLUSIONS: The results of this systematic review of RGL versus WGL demonstrate that RGL technique produces lower positive margins rates and fewer re-operations. While this review is limited by the small size and quality of RCTs, the odds ratios suggest that RGL may be a superior technique to guide surgical resection of non-palpable breast cancers. These results should be confirmed by larger, multi-centered RCTs.