title: A novel method for sentinel lymph node biopsy by indocyanine green fluorescence technique in breast cancer.
abstract: We investigated the feasibility of sentinel lymph node (SLN) biopsy using indocyanine green (ICG) technique in 411 patients with early breast cancer at three institutes. ICG, a fluorescence source, and blue dye were injected into the subareolar area to enable real-time image-guided surgery and identification of SLN fluorescence after meticulous dissection. The subcutaneous lymphatic channels were precisely detected in all cases. SLN identification rate was 99% (408/411) with a mean of 2.3 nodes identified per patient. Thirty-nine cases (9.5%) had SLNs involved and all of them were ICG positive. Thus, the ICG technique has a high SLN identification rate comparable with that of the radioisotope method.
authors.affiliation: Department of Breast Surgery, Kyoto University Hospital, 54 Kawara-cho Shogoin, Sakyo-ku Kyoto 606-8507, Japan. sugie@kuhp.kyoto-u.ac.jp.
authors.forename: Tomoharu
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Sugie
authors.forename: Kassim Abdelazeem
authors.initials: KA
authors.lastname: Kassim
authors.forename: Megumi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Takeuchi
authors.forename: Takashi
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Hashimoto
authors.forename: Kazuhiko
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Yamagami
authors.forename: Yoshikazu
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Masai
authors.forename: Masakazu
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Toi