CEA expression and molecular analysis for cytological diagnosis in breast tumors

Abstract

Objectives: Fine-needle aspiration (FNA) biopsy of breast tumors is reliable in diagnosing breast carcinoma, but cytological difficulties way exist in definitively distinguishing malignant from benign lesions. To improve the reliability of cytological diagnosis, we evaluated the usefulness of carcinoembryonic antigen (CEA) in such diagnosis.
Study Design: We evaluated 176 breast tumors, determining CEA expression via immunocytochemistry. We compared immunocytochemistry and molecular analysis using RT-PCR in 36 fresh breast tumors and 6 human cancer cell lines.
Results: Immunocytochemistry showed that the sensitivity of cytological diagnosis was 64.7% and that the specificity was 90.9%. The concordance between the two was 83% in fresh tumors and 100% in human cancer cell lines.
Conclusion: We found CEA to be useful in the cytological diagnosis of breast malignancy, because it helps distinguish malignant from benign breast tumors. Molecular analysis is thus expected to improve the accuracy of cytological diagnosis.