Abstract
This study investigates the use of two spectroscopic techniques, auto-fluorescence lifetime measurement (AFLM) and light reflectance spectroscopy (LRS), for detecting invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC) in human ex vivo breast specimens. AFLM used excitation at 447 nm with multiple emission wavelengths (532, 562, 632, and 644 nm), at which auto-fluorescence lifetimes and their weight factors were analyzed using a double exponent model. LRS measured reflectance spectra in the range of 500-840 nm and analyzed the spectral slopes empirically at several distinct spectral regions. Our preliminary results based on 93 measured locations (i.e., 34 IDC, 31 benign fibrous, 28 adipose) from 6 specimens show significant differences in 5 AFLM-derived parameters and 9 LRS-based spectral slopes between benign and malignant breast samples. Multinomial logistic regression with a 10-fold cross validation approach was implemented with selected features to classify IDC from benign fibrous and adipose tissues for the two techniques independently as well as for the combined dual-modality approach. The accuracy for classifying IDC was found to be 96.4 ± 0.8%, 92.3 ± 0.8% and 96 ± 1.3% for LRS, AFLM, and dual-modality, respectively.
Highlights
Breast cancer is one of the most common forms of cancers among American women with an estimated 230,480 new cases and 39,520 deaths in 2011 alone [1]
Overall 20 auto-fluorescence lifetime measurement (AFLM) parameters were obtained from each measured location
Among the rest of the parameters, some showed significant differences either between invasive ductal carcinoma (IDC) and fibrous tissue (FT) or between IDC and adipose tissue (AT), but not differentiating IDC from both FT and AT, whereas some did not show any significant difference among any tissue types
Summary
Breast cancer is one of the most common forms of cancers among American women with an estimated 230,480 new cases and 39,520 deaths in 2011 alone [1]. With the advancement in diagnostic techniques, it is possible to diagnose breast cancer in early stages while it is still localized. Surgery is imminent in treating breast cancer, with many early stage patients being cured without recurrence. The goals of the surgery include complete resection of the primary tumor, with negative margins to reduce the risk of local recurrences. Due to lack of definitive tools for intraoperative assessment of cancer margin during lumpectomy, there is incidence of positive margins in 20-50% of patients who undergo the procedure [3,4]. Patients with positive margins must undergo a second surgery, leading to higher risk of wound infection, associated psychological distress, compromised cosmesis, and added medical expenses. An accurate diagnostic tool that helps in assessing these margins intraoperatively is essential
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