The Utility of Toluidine Blue for Assessing Cross Contamination in Fluid Specimens

Abstract

Results: All of the patients found in this study presented with malignant pleural effusion or ascitesdother serous cavity effusions resulting from metastatic breast carcinoma were not seen. “Cannonball” formation was only found in 5 of the six cases of moderately differentiated (Nottingham grade 2) breast carcinoma (Figure 1). All five of these cases had Nottingham sub-scores of 3 for tubule formation, 2 for pleomorphism, and 1 for mitotic activity. The 5 cases of primary breast carcinoma with poor differentiation (grade 3) and with malignant effusion all displayed single malignant cells or dyshesive clusters of malignant cells (Figure 2). The average time from breast biopsy to detection of malignant effusion was 298 days for grade 2 primary breast carcinoma and 2003 days for grade 3 primary breast carcinoma (Table 1). Immunohistochemistry for common breast carcinoma molecular markers was noted for the original biopsy and malignant effusion. In the malignant effusion, ER and PR were often lost while mammoglobin was commonly retained (Table 2).