title: Patient age affects identification rate of sentinel nodes in breast cancer.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  The aim of this study was to investigate whether clinicopathological features affect the success rate of identifying sentinel nodes using a combination method of dye and radioisotope in breast cancer patients.
  
  
  METHODS
  Sentinel node biopsy was performed in patients (n = 154) with stage I and II breast cancer using a combination method. The association between the clinicopathological features of breast cancer and the success rate in the identification of sentinel nodes was investigated.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Sentinel nodes were successfully identified in 147 (95.5%) of the 154 patients. There was a concordance between the sentinel-node and axillary-node status in 146 (99.3%) of 147 cases. The false negative rate of the sentinel node biopsy was 2.4% (1/42). The identification rate of sentinel nodes was significantly (P = 0.005) lower in patients > or = 60 years (84.4%) than in those < 60 years (98.4%). The tumor size, histological node status, lympo-vascular invasion, history of previous surgical biopsy, operative procedure, tumor location, and histological type were not related with the identification rate of sentinel nodes. The mean count ratio of all hot nodes was 14.0 (range 2.0-73.6) in patients > or = 60 years and 73.4 (2.0-1700.6) in patients < 60 years, and this difference was statistically significant (P < 0.0001). In addition, the mean number of sentinel nodes was significantly (P = 0.0006) lower in patients > or = 60 years (1.3; range one to four) than in patients < 60 years (2.1; range one to 12).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Patient age affects the identification rate of sentinel nodes using a combination method in breast cancer.
authors.affiliation: Department of Surgery, Osaka Medical Center for Cancer and Cardiovascular Diseases, 1-3-3 Nakamichi, Higashinari-ku, Osaka 537-8511, Japan. motomurak@hotmail.com
authors.forename: Kazuyoshi
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Motomura
authors.forename: Yoshifumi
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Komoike
authors.forename: Hideo
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Inaji
authors.forename: Yoshihisa
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Hasegawa
authors.forename: Tsutomu
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kasugai
authors.forename: Shinzaburo
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Noguchi
authors.forename: Hiroki
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Koyama
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008875:Middle Aged; D010361:Patients; D021701:Sentinel Lymph Node Biopsy / Q000379:methods / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*