Abstract:Objective To evaluate the diagnostic accuracy of intraoperative frozen section in breast neoplasms and to improve the diagnostic accuracy rate,to promote closer communication betwen clinicians and pathologists,mutually increase an understanding of frozen sections, and thus decrease the rate of misdiagnosis.
Methods The diagnostic reports of intraoperative frozen sections and paraffin sections of 590 cases with breast neoplasms taken in the recent 8 and a half years were analyzed retrospectively.
Results 586 cases (99.32%) of intraoperative frozen sections were diagnosed correctly and 4(0.68%) were misdiagnosed. In the 4 misdiagnosed cases,2 cases of infiltrating ductal carcinoma were misdiagnosed as benign lesions,due to questionable quality of the slides,and 2 cases of lobular cystic sarcoma were misdiagnosed as fibroadeuoma,due to removal of insufficient specimen.
Conclusions The chief causes of misdiagnosis and delayed diagnosis of frozen sections are specimen limitations,varied morphology of the lesions,and quality of the frozen sections.When there is familiarity with the main aspects of diagnosis and differential diagnosis of breast pathology and enhancement of communication between the surgeon and pathologist,then frozen section of breast masses is an accurate and reliable method of investigation.