title: Baseline staging of newly diagnosed breast cancer--Kuwait cancer control center experience.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To determine the value of staging investigations in detecting metastases in newly diagnosed asymptomatic patients with breast cancer.
  
  
  METHODS
  A retrospective review of patients' files with newly diagnosed breast cancer in the period from 1993 to 1998 was performed. Due to inadequate information, thirty-eight files were excluded leaving 785 files for analysis.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Of the total 785 patients, we found distant metastases at the time of primary diagnosis in 36 (4.6%) patients, bone metastases in 29 (3.7%) patients, pulmonary metastases in 6 (0.8%) patients and liver metastases in 5 (0.6%) patients. Overall, 0.7% of patients with clinical stage I and II disease had metastases compared with 16.2% of patients with clinical stage III disease (statistically significant p = 0.0001).
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The results confirm the low yield of routine bone scans, liver ultrasound and chest X-ray among patients with asymptomatic early-stage breast cancer. These tests are therefore not recommended for such patients, although intensive investigations are appropriate for more advanced tumors.
authors.affiliation: Department of Radiation Oncology, Kuwait Cancer Control Center, Kuwait. zlouf@hotmail.com
authors.forename: Sadeq
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Abuzallouf
authors.forename: Mohammad
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Motawy
authors.forename: Ziad
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Thotathil
mesh_terms: D001859:Bone Neoplasms / Q000556:secondary; D001943:Breast Neoplasms / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007730:Kuwait / Q000453:epidemiology; D008113:Liver Neoplasms / Q000556:secondary; D008175:Lung Neoplasms / Q000556:secondary; D009367:Neoplasm Staging